SERMONS 



THEISM, ATHEISM, 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY 



BY 



THEODORE PARKER, 

MINISTER OF THE TWENTY-EIGHTH CONGREGATIONAL SOCIETY IN BOSTON. 



SECOND EDITIO^, -• 



BOSTON: 
RUFUS LEIGH TON, JR. 

1859. 




Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1856, by 
THEODORE PARKER, 
[n the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. 



CAMBRIDGE I 

ALLEN AND FARNHAM, STEREOTYPERS AND PRINTERS. 



TO THE 

REV. WILLIAM H. WHITE, 

AND THE 

REV. GEORGE FISKE, 

WITH GRATITUDE FOR EARLY INSTRUCTION RECEIVED AT THEIR HANDS, 

THIS VOLUME IS DEDICATED 

BY 

THE AUTHOR 



PREFACE. 



The present volume forms part of a long series of 
Sermons, but has a certain completeness in itself, and 
is, perhaps, intelligible without reference to what pre- 
ceded or followed. Almost the whole of the volume 
is printed from the notes of Mr. Leighton, an accom- 
plished phonographer ; only the three latter sermons 
were written out by myself. I have often been asked 
to repeat this portion of the series, but prefer to lay 
it before a larger public than a merely spoken word can 
reach. 



Boston, July 16th, 1853. 

A* 



(v) 



WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR. 

A Discourse of Matters Pertaining to Religion. 

1 vol. 12mo $1.25 

An Introduction to the Old Testament. From the 

German of De Wette. 2d ed. 2 vols. 8vo. . . . 3.75 

Critical and Miscellaneous Writings. 1 vol. 12mo. 1.25 

Massachusetts Quarterly Review, 1848-50. 3 vols. 

8vo. In Numbers. ....... 4.50 

Occasional Sermons and Speeches. 2 vols. 12mo. . 2.50 

Ten Sermons of Religion. 1 vol. 12mo. . . . 1.00 

Sermons of Theism, Atheism, and the Popular The- 
ology. 1 vol. 12mo 1.25 

Additional Sermons and Speeches. 2 vols. 12mo. . 2.50 

The Trial of Theodore Parker for the "Misde- 
meanor " of a Speech in Faneuil Hall against 

Kidnapping, with the Defence. 1855. 1 vol. 8vo. 1.00 



PAMPHLETS. 

A Sermon of Old Age. (1854.) 15 

The Dangers which Threaten the Rights of Man 

in America. (1854.) . . . . . . 20 

The Moral Dangers Incident to Prosperity. (1855.) 15 

Consequences of an Immoral Principle. (1855.) . 15 

Function of a Minister. (1855.) 20 



CONTEXTS. 



PAGE 



Introduction, ix 

I. 

Of Speculative Atheism, regarded as a Theory of the 

Universe, 1 

II. 

Of Practical Atheism, regarded as a Principle of 

Ethics, 33 

m. 

Of the Popular Theology of Christendom, regarded as 

a Theory of the Universe, 73 

IV. 

Of the Popular Theology of Christendom, regarded 

as a Principle of Ethics, Ill 

V. 

Of Speculative Theism, regarded as a Theory of the 

Universe, 149 



(vii) 



VU1 CONTENTS. 

VI. 

Of Practical Theism, regarded as a Principle of 

Ethics, 181 

VII. 

Of the Function and Influence of the Idea of Immor- 
tal Life, 217 

VIII. 

Of the Universal Providence of God, .... 247 

IX. 

Of the Economy of Pain and Misery under the Uni- 
versal Providence of God. Part I. . . .277 



X. 

Of the Economy of Pain and Misery under the Uni- 
versal Providence of God. Part II. . . .319 



INTRODUCTION. 



SOME THOUGHTS ON THE CONDITION OF CHRISTENDOM. 

At Rome, eighteen centuries ago this very year, 
Nero was married to a maiden called Octavia. He 
was the son of Ahenobarbus and Agrippina ; the son 
of a father so abandoned and a mother so profligate 
that when congratulated by his friends on the birth of 
his first child, and that child a son, the father said, what 
is born of such a father as I, and such a mother as my 
wife, can only be for the ruin of the State. Octavia 
was yet worse born. She was the daughter of Clau- 
dius and Messalina. Claudius was the Emperor of 
Rome, stupid by nature, licentious and drunken by long 
habit, and infamous for cruelty in that age never sur- 
passed for its oppressiveness, before or since. Messa- 
lina, his third wife, was a monster of wickedness, who 
had every vice that can disgrace the human kind, ex- 
cept avarice and hypocrisy : her boundless prodigality 
saved her from avarice, and her matchless impudence 
kept her clean from hypocrisy. Too incontinent even 

(ix) 



z 



INTRODUCTION. 



of money to hoard it, she was so careless of the opin- 
ions of others that she made no secret of any vice. 
Her name is still the catchword for the most loathsome 
acts that can be conceived of. She was put to death 
for attempting to destroy her husband's life; he was 
drunk when he signed the warrant, and when he heard 
that his wife had been assassinated at his command he 
went to drinking again. 

Agrippina, the mother of Nero, and the bitterest ene- 
my of Messalina, took her place in a short time and 
became the fourth wife of her uncle Claudius, who suc- 
ceeded to the last and deceased husband of Agrippina 
only as he succeeded to the first Roman king — a 
whole commonwealth of predecessors intervening. Oc- 
tavia, aged eleven, was already espoused to another, 
who took his life when his bride's father married the 
mother of Nero, well knowing the fate that else awaited 
him. Claudius, repudiating his own son, adopted Nero 
as his child and imperial heir. In less than two years 
Agrippina poisoned her husband, and by a coup d? etat 
put Nero on the throne, who, erelong, procured the 
murder of his own mother, Seneca the philosopher 
helping him in the plot, but also in due time to fall by 
the hand of the tyrant. 

Eighteen centuries ago this very year, Nero, expect- 
ing to be emperor, married Octavia, — he sixteen years 
old, yet debauched already by premature licentiousness, 
— she but eleven, espoused to another who had already 
fallen by his own hand, bringing calculated odium on 



INTRODUCTION. 



xi 



the imperial family ; a yet sadder fate awaited the mis- 
erable maid thus bartered away in infancy. 

This marriage of the Emperor's adopted son with his 
only daughter was doubtless thought a great event. 
Every body knew of it: among the millions that 
swarmed in Rome, probably there was not a female 
slave but knew the deed. Historians in their gravity 
paused to record it ; poets, doubtless, with the custom- 
ary flattery of that inconstant tribe, wrote odes on the 
occasion of this shameless marriage of a dissolute boy 
and an unfortunate girl. 

The same year, fifty-three after the birth of Christ, 
according to the most ancient chronological canon 
which has come down to us, there came to Rome an 
obscure man Saul by name which he had altered to 
Paul ; a sail-maker, as it seems, from the little city of 
Tarsus in Cilicia. Nobody took much notice of it.. 
Nay, the time of his coming is quite uncertain and hard 
to ascertain ; and it appears that the writer of this most 
ancient chronicle, though he lived sixteen or seventeen 
hundred years nearer the fact than we do, was mistaken, 
and that in the year fifty-three Paul went to Corinth 
for the first time and dwelt there ; and eight years after, 
in the spring of the year, was brought a prisoner to 
Rome. These curiosities of chronology show how un- 
important Paul's coming was thought at that time. 
The marriage of a dissolute boy, with an unfortunate 
girl, was set down as a great thing, while the coming 



xu 



INTRODUCTION. 



of Paul was too slight a circumstance to deserve 
notice. 

He came from a hated nation, — the Jews were 
thought the enemies of mankind, — he was a poor ple- 
beian, a mechanic, and lived in an age when military 
power and riches had such an influence as never before, 
or since. He was apparently an unlettered man, or 
had only the rough, narrow culture which a Hebrew 
scholar got at Tarsus and Jerusalem. He had little 
eloquence ; " his bodily presence was weak, and his 
speech contemptible." He came to the most populous 
city in the world, the richest and the wickedest. Nero 
and Agrippina were types of wealthy and patrician 
Rome ; for that reason it is that I began by telling their 
story, and, though aware of the true chronology, have 
connected this atrocious wedlock with the coming of 
the Apostle. 

The city was full of soldiers ; men from Parthia and 
Britain, who had fought terrible battles, bared their 
scars in the Forum and the Palace of the Cassars. 
Learned men were there. Political Greece had died ; 
but Grecian genius long outlived the shock which over- 
turned the state. Of science Greece was full, and her 
learned men and men well-born with genius fled to 
Rome. The noble minds from that classic land went 
there, full of thought, full of eloquence and song, run- 
ning over with beauty. Rough, mountainous streams 
of young talent from Spain and Africa flowed thither, 
finding their home in that great oceanic city. The 



INTRODUCTION. 



xiii 



Syrian Orontes had emptied itself into the Tiber. 
There were temples of wondrous splendor and rich- 
ness, priests celebrated for their culture and famed for 
their long descent. All these were hostile to the new 
form of religion taught by Paul. 

But the popular theology was only mythology. It 
was separate from science, alienated from the life of 
the people. The temple did not represent philosophy, 
nor morality, nor piety. The priests of the popular 
religion had no belief in the truth of its doctrines, no 
faith in the efficacy of its forms. Religion was tradi- 
tion with the priest ; it was police with the magistrate. 
The Roman augurs did not dare look each other in the 
face> on solemn days, lest they should laugh outright 
and betray to the people what was the open secret of 
the priest. 

Everywhere, as a man turned his eye in Rome, there 
was riches, everywhere power, everywhere vice. Did I 
say everywhere ? No ; — the shadow of riches is pov- 
erty, and there was such poverty as only St. Giles's 
Parish in London can now equal. The shadow of 
power is slavery ; and there was such slavery in Rome 
as American New Orleans and Charleston cannot boast. 
Did I say there was vice everywhere ? No : in the 
shadow of vice there always burns the still, calm flame 
of piety, justice, philanthropy ; that is the light which 
goeth not out by day, which is never wholly quenched. 
But slavery and poverty and sin were at home in that 
city, — such slavery, such poverty, and such sin as 

B 



INTRODUCTION. 



savage lands know nothing of. If we put together the 
crime, the gluttony, the licentiousness of New Orleans, 
New York, Paris, London, Vienna, and add the mili- 
tary power of St. Petersburg, we may have an approxi- 
mate idea of the condition of ancient Rome in the year 
fifty-three after Christ. Let none deny the manly vir- 
tue, the womanly nobleness, which also found a home 
therein ; still it was a city going to destruction, and the 
causes of its ruin were swiftly at work. 

Christianity came to Rome with Paul of Tarsus. 
The tidings thereof went before him. Nobody knows 
who brought them first. It was a new " superstition," 
not much known as yet. It was the religion of a 
" blasphemer " who had got crucified between " two 
others, malefactors." Christianity was then " the latest 
form of infidelity." Paul himself came there a pris- 
oner, but so obscure that nobody knows what year he 
came, how long he remained, or what his fate was. 
" He lived two years in his own hired house," — that 
is the last historic word which comes down to us of 
the great apostle. Catholic traditions tell us of mis- 
sions to various places, and then round it off with mar- 
tyrdom. The martyrdom only is probable, the missions 
obviously fictitious. Probably he was in jail to the end 
of his days, when the headsmen ferried that great soul 
into heaven ; — and very seldom was it, so it seems, 
that he took over so weighty a freight as Paul made for 
that bark. 



INTKODUCTION. 



XV 



The sail-maker brought the new religion. It was an 
idea, and action also ; belief in men and life out of 
them. It had nothing to recommend it, only itself and 
himself. Paul offered no worldly riches, no honor, no 
respectability. A man who "joined the church" then, 
did not have his name trumpeted in the newspapers ; 
did not get introduced to reputable society ; did not 
find his honor and respectability everywhere enhanced 
by that fact. 

Christianity had these things to offer, — scorn, loath- 
ing, contempt, hatred from father and mother, from the 
husband of the wife's bosom, — for probably it was the 
wife who went first, it is commonly so, — and at last it 
offered a cruel death. But it told of a to-morrow after 
to-day ; of a law higher than the statutes of Nero ; of 
one God, the Father of all men ; of a kingdom of 
Heaven, where all is sunlight and peace and beauty 
and triumph. Paul himself had got turned out of the 
whole Eastern world, and the founder of this scheme 
of religion had just been hanged as a blasphemer. 
Christianity was treason to the Hebrew State ; to the 
Roman Church the latest form of infidelity. 

Doubtless there were great errors connected with the 
Christian doctrine. One need only read the epistles of 
Paul to know that. But there were great truths. The 
oneness of God, the brotherhood of men, the soul's im- 
mortality, the need of a virtuous, blameless, brave life 
on earth, — these were the great truths of Christianity ; 
and they were set off by a life as great as the truths, 



xvi 



INTRODUCTION. 



a life of brave work and manly self-denial and self- 
sacrifice. 

The early, nay, the earliest Christians had many an 
error. How does wheat grow ? With manifold straw ; 
and there are whole cart-loads of straw for a single 
sack of wheat corn. The straw is needful ; not a grain 
of corn could grow without it ; by and by, it litters the 
horses, and presently rots and fertilizes the ground 
whence it came. But the grain lives on ; and is seed- 
corn for future generations, or bread-corn to feed the 
living. 

Christianity as an idea was far in advance of Juda- 
ism and Hebraism. As a life it transcended every 
thing which the highest man had dreamed of in days 
before. Men tried to put it down, crucified Jesus, 
stoned his disciples, put them in jail, scourged them, 
slew them with all manner of torture. But the more 
they blew the fire, the more swiftly it burned. Water 
the ground with valiant blood, the young blade of 
heroism springs up and blossoms red : the maiden 
blooms white out of the martyr blood which her mother 
had shed on the ground ; and there is a great crop of 
hairy men full of valor. Christians smiled when they 
looked the rack in the face ; laughed at martyrdom, and 
said to the tormentors, " Do you want necks for your 
block ? Here are ours. Betwixt us and Heaven there 
is only a red sea, and any axe makes a bridge wide 
enough for a soul to go over. Exodus out of Egypt is 
entrance to the promised land. Fire is a good chariot 
for a Christian Elias." 



INTRODUCTION. 



xvii 



In a few hundred years that sail-maker had swept 
Rome of Heathenism : not a temple remained Pagan, 
Even the statues got converted to Christianity, and 
Minerva became the Virgin Mary ; Venus took the vow 
and was a Magdalene ; Olympian Jove was christened 
Simon Peter : everybody sees at Rome a bronze statue 
of Jupiter, older than Paul's time, which is now put in 
the great cathedral and baptized Simon Peter; and 
thousands of Catholics kiss the foot of what was once 
" Heathen Jove." The gods of Rome gave way to the 
carpenter of Nazareth ; he was called God. The Chris- 
tian ideas and great Christian life of Paul of Tarsus 
put all Olympus to rout. 

Then in thirteen or fourteen hundred years more 
there slowly got builded up the most remarkable 
scheme of theology that the world ever saw. Hebra- 
ism went slowly down ; Heathenism went slowly down. 
Barbarism, a great storm from the North, beat on the 
roof of the Christian house, and it fell not ; — No, bar- 
barism ran off from the eaves of the Christian church 
to water the garden of Italy, Spain, France, Germany, 
England ; they were blessed by that river of God which 
fell from the eaves. 

But Hebraism, Heathenism, Barbarism — as forms 
of religion — did not die all at once, they are not yet 
wholly dead. No one of them was altogether a mis- 
take. Each of them had some truth, some beauty, 
which mankind needed, and there they must stand face 
to face with Christianity till it has absorbed all of their 

B* 



xviii 



INTRODUCTION. 



excellence into itself: then they will perish. Individual 
freedom was the contribution which German Barbar- 
ism brought, and we have got much of that enshrined 
in our trial by jury, representative democracy, and a 
hundred other forms. Deep faith in God and fidelity to 
one's own conscience, — these are the great things 
which Moses and Samuel and David and Esaias and 
Ezra taught ; and accordingly the Old Testament lies 
on every pulpit lid in all Christendom to this day, and 
will not sink because it has those excellences. Heathen- 
ism had science, beauty, law, power of organization; 
they also must be added to the Christian civilization 
before Heathenism goes to its rest. We have not got 
all the good from Heathenism yet ; and accordingly the 
superior culture of Christendom is based on Greek and 
Roman classics : Fathers send their boys to superior 
schools that they may learn from the Heathen ; that 
they may acquire strength of reasoning from Aristotle 
and Plato, the bravery of eloquence from Cicero and 
Demosthenes, and the beauty of literary art from Homer 
and Horace and Sophocles and .ZEschylus, and that 
mighty army of genius whose trumpets stir the world. 
From many a clime, for many an age, do "pilgrims 
pensive, but unwearied, throng " to Athens and Rome, 
to study the remains of ancient art ; remnants of tem- 
ples are brought over the sea to every Christian land, to 
bless the Christian heart with Pagan beauty. Patient 
mankind never loses a useful truth. 



INTRODUCTION. 



xix 



It is curious to look and see how little notice was 
taken of Christianity coming to Rome. The men of 
pleasure knew nothing of the strife betwixt the old and 
new in Paul's time ; the political economists of that 
day, as it seems, foresaw no productive power in Chris- 
tianity ; the politicians took little notice thereof, till Nero 
sought to cut off the neck of Christendom at one blow. 
A historian — Roman all through, in his hard powerful 
nature, but furnished with masterly Greek culture, — 
spoke of Christianity as " that detestable superstition," 
which, with other mischiefs, had flowed down into 
Rome, the common sink of all abominations. Sour 
Juvenal gave the new religion a wipe with his swift 
lash, dipping it first in bitter ink. Pliny the younger 
wrote a line to the emperor, asking how he should treat 
these pestilent fellows, the Christians, who are not afraid 
to die. This is all the notice literary Rome took of 
Christianity for a century or so. Men knew not the 
force which was going to baptize Pagan Rome with 
the Christian name. Yet in their time, while the vo- 
luptuous were seeking for a new pleasure, while the 
Stoics and Epicureans were doubting which was the 
chief good, while politicians were busy with troops and 
battles, — there came silently into Rome a power which 
shook Heathenism down to the dust ; and the great 
battle betwixt new and old took place, and they knew 
it not. So an old story tells that when Rome and 
Africa crossed swords in great battle on Italian soil, 
they fought with such violence and ardor, that while 



XX 



INTRODUCTION. 



an earthquake came and shook down a neighboring 
city they kept fighting on, and knew only then own 
convulsion. So in the fray of pain and pleasure, the 
great earthquake which threw down the Hebrew and 
Pagan Theology " reeled unheededly away." 

Now old Rome is buried twenty feet thick with 
modern Rome ; the civilization of Europe is Christian, 
— all but a corner of it where the Crescent eclipses the 
Cross. Nay, in London and Boston and New York is 
a society of " unsocial Britons divided from all the 
world," which spreads abroad the words of Paul and 
of Jesus, and in twenty years has translated the gospel 
of Christ and the epistles of Paul into one hundred 
and forty-seven different tongues, and spread them 
amongst men from the Thames to the " fabulous Hy- 
daspes ; " yea, from one end of the world to the other. 
In countries alike unknown to the science of Strabo 
and Plato's dream, the words of these two Hebrews 
have found a home : and now two hundred and sixty 
millions of men worship the Crucified as God. Not 
a great city all Europe through, but has a great church 
dedicated to that sail-maker of Tarsus, whose journey to 
Rome was so significant and so unchronicled. 

What power there must have been in the ideas and 
the life of those men, to effect such a conquest in such 
a time ! It is no wonder that many ordinary men, who 
know Christianity by rote and heroism by hearsay, and 
who think that to join a fashionable church is " to re- 



INTRODUCTION. 



xxi 



nounce the world," — it is no wonder that they think 
Christianity spread miraculously, that God wrote a 
truth and sowed Christianity broadcast and, if men 
would not take it without, He harrowed it into them 
by miracle. Judging from then consciousness, what is 
there that they know which could explain the spread 
of Christianity, and the heroism of a man laying his 
head, and his wife's and children's heads, on the block 
for a conscientious conviction ? Doubtless they are 
just and true to what is actual in themselves in believ- 
ing that Christianity spread by miracle ; and if a man 
has not soul enough to trust that soul, it is easy to 
see how he may think that every great truth came by 
miracle. An Esquimaux would suppose that a rail- 
road car went miraculously. 

Eighteen hundred years, with threescore generations 
of men, have passed by since Paul first went to Rome. 
"What a change since then ! It is worth while to look 
at the ecclesiastical condition of Christendom at this 
day. The Christian Church has very great truths, 
which will last for ever. But as a whole it seems to me 
that at this day the Christian Church is in a state of 
decay. I do not mean to say that Religion decays, — 
piety and morality : the sun will fade out of the heavens 
before they perish out of man's heart. But the power 
of that institution which is called the Christian Church, 
the power of its priesthood, — that is assuredly in a 
state of decay. It has separated itself from new Science, 



xxii 



INTRODUCTION. 



the fresh thought of mankind ; from new Morality, the 
fresh practical life of mankind ; from new Justice ; from 
new Philanthropy ; from new Piety. It looks back for 
its inspiration. Its God is a dead God ; its Christ is 
a crucified Christ ; all its saints are dead men : its the- 
ology is a dead science, its vaunted miracles only of old 
time, not new. Paul asked for these three things, — 
liberty, equality, brotherhood. Does the Christian 
Church ask for any one of the three ? It does not 
trust Human Nature in its normal action ; does not 
look to the human Mind for truth, nor the human Con- 
science for justice, nor the human Heart and Soul for 
love and faith. It does not trust the living God, now 
revealing himself in the fresh flowers of to-day and the 
fresh consciousness of man. It looks back to some 
alleged action in the history of mankind, counting the 
History of man better than man's Nature. It looks 
back to some alleged facts in the history of God, count- 
ing those fictitious miracles as greater than the nature 
of God ; He has done his best, spoken for the last time ! 

In all this the whole Christian Church agrees, and is 
unitary, and there is no discord betwixt Catholic and 
Protestant. But they differ in respect to the things to 
which they pay supreme and sovereign homage. The 
Catholic worships the Church : that is infallible, with 
its biblical and extra-biblical tradition, and its inspi- 
ration. The Roman Church is the religion of the 
Catholic. He must necessarily be intolerant. Two 
writers prominent in the Catholic Church of America 



INTRODUCTION. 



xxiii 



within the last few months have declared that the 
Catholic Church is just as intolerant as she always 
was, and as soon as she gets power there shall be no 
more freedom of thought and speech in the new con- 
tinent : she only waits for a hand to clutch the sword 
and put Protestantism to death. This comes una- 
voidably from her position. She must be sure that 
everybody else is wrong. 

The Protestants worship the Bible, with its Old Tes- 
tament and New ; that is infallible. The Bible is the 
religion of the Protestants, as the Church is the religion 
of the Catholics, and the Koran of the Mahometans. 
This is the ultimate source of religious doctrinej the 
ultimate standard of religious practice. Here the Prot- 
estant sects are unitary ; even the Universalists and Uni- 
tarians agree in this same thing, or profess to do so. 

Then the Protestants differ about the doctrines* of 
that infallible word ; and so while one hand of Protes- 
tantism is clenched on the Bible, the other is divided 
into a great many fingers, each pointing to its own 
creed as the infallible interpretation of the infallible 
word: the one pencil of white Protestant sunshine, 
drawn from the Bible, is broken by the historic prism 
into manifold rays of antithetic color. 

It is a great mistake for the Christians as a whole to 
maintain that they have nothing to learn from the 
Hebrews, the Heathen, the Buddhists and the Mahom- 
etans ; — though the Christians are in many respects 
superior to these other sects of the world, yet they have 



xxiv 



INTRODUCTION. 



much to teach us. It is a mistake for the Protestant to 
say he has nothing to learn from the Catholic : the 
Catholic — though far behind the Protestant — has 
many things to impart to us. And it is a mistake for 
the Unitarian, or Universalist, to declare that he has 
nothing to learn from the Trinitarian and Partialist. 
As yet no one of these great world sects, Christian, 
Heathen, Hebrew, Budhist, Mahometan, has the whole 
Human truth ; and in Christianity no one sect has the 
whole of Christian truth. 

But the Christian churches have broken with Science, 
and are afraid of new thought. This is somewhat less 
true of the Protestant than of the Catholic priesthood. 
They have broken also with fresh Morality, and are 
afraid of that. And so the Christian Church to-day is 
very much in the same condition that Heathenism and 
Judaism were at the time when Paul first went to Rome. 

Nearly twelve centuries ago the subtle Grecian intel- 
lect separated from the practical sense of the western 
world, and for more than eight hundred years there 
were two Christian churches, the Greek and the Latin. 
Three hundred years ago a deadly blow was struck at 
the unity of the Latin Church. Since then there have 
been three Christian churches, the Greek, the Catholic, 
and the Protestant ; the two former only conservative, 
the latter also progressive, but not progressive in ortho- 
doxy, progressive only by heresy, — for the Church care- 
fully cuts off the top of its own tree as soon as it is 
found to have new and independent life therein ; it falls 



INTRODUCTION. 



XXV 



to the ground, and grows up a new tree. The Catholic 
Church cut off the Protestants ; in the Protestant Church 
the Trinitarians cut off the Unitarians ; and now the 
Unitarians seek to cut off those who have newer life than 
theirs, newer blossoms. 

In the Christian Church there are many churches. 
But there is not one that bears the same relation to the 
civilization of the world which Paul bore eighteen hun- 
dred years ago. He looked forward ; they look back. 
He asked liberty of thought and speech ; they are 
afraid of both. There is not a Christian government 
which has not some statute forbidding freedom of 
thought and speech. Even on the statute-books of 
Massachusetts there slumbers a law prohibiting a man 
to speak lightly of any of the doctrines in this blessed 
bible ; and it is not twenty years since a magistrate of 
this State asked the grand-jury of a county to find a 
true bill against a learned Doctor of Divinity, who had 
written an article proving there was no prophecy in the 
Old Testament which pointed a plain finger to the 
person of Jesus of Nazareth. 

All over Europe religion is supported by the State, 
by the arm of the law. The clergy wish it to be so, 
and they say Christianity would fail if it were not. 
Hence come the costly national churches of Europe, 
wherein the priest sits on the cartridge-box, supported 
by bayonets, a drum for his sounding-board, and 
preaches in the name of the Prince of Peace, having 
cannon balls to enforce his argument. What a eon- 

c 



xxvi 



INTRODUCTION. 



trastj between the national churches of Russia, Austria, 
Prussia, England, and the first church which Paul 
gathered in his prisonhouse, where he preached with 
his left hand chained to a soldier's right hand, " his bod- 
ily presence weak and his speech contemptible." 

But there has been a great and rapid development of 
humanity since Paul first came to Italy. What a 
change in agriculture, mechanic art, commerce, war, in 
education, politics ! What new science, new art, new 
literature has sprung up ! How the world's geography 
has changed, from Eratosthenes to Hitter ! But the 
interior geography of man has altered yet more. The 
ancient poles are now in the modern equator. Com- 
pare the governments then and now ; the wars of that 
period ; the condition of the people. The Peasant was 
everywhere a slave at that time. Now slavery has fled 
to America — she alone of all Christendom fosters in 
her bosom that odious snake which has stung and 
poisoned so many a departed State. Compare the con- 
dition of Woman. The change has been immense. 
The compass gave mankind America; gunpowder 
made a republic possible ; — it could not have been 
without that ; — the printing-press made education 
accessible to everybody. Steam makes it easy for a 
nation to secure the material riches which are indispen- 
sable to civilization, and yet leave time for culture in 
the great mass of men. How have the humanities gone 
forward, — freedom, education, temperance, chastity ; 
concern for the poor, the weak, the abandoned, the 



INTRODUCTION. 



XXV11 



blind, the deaf, the dumb ! Once the Christian Church 
fostered the actual humanities of the times. There was 
not a temperance society in the world ; the Church was 
the temperance society. There was not a peace society, 
the Church was the peace society: not an education 
society ; the Church opened her motherly arms to many 
a poor man's son who had talent, and gave him culture ; 
and he walked through the cathedral door into the 
college, thence to the great mountain of the world and 
climbed as high as he could get. Now as the Church 
is in the process of decay we need special missionary 
societies, societies for preventing drunkenness and every 
vice. The function of the ancient Church has passed 
to other hands. She teaches only from memory of 
times long past. The national churches apologize for 
the national sins and defend them. In Europe the es- 
tablished clergy are seldom friendly to any movement 
for the benefit of mankind. In America it is they who 
are eminent supporters of every public enormity which 
the nation loves, willing to send their mother into 
slavery, pressing the Bible into the ranks of American 
sin. 

The Christian Church early departed from the piety 
and morality of Jesus of Nazareth. Taken as a whole 
it has made some great errors and is now suffering the 
penalty thereof. It has taught that God was finite, and 
not infinite ; That man's nature was a mistake, a nature 
which could not be trusted ; it has put fictitious miracles 
before real law, and forced the heretic philosopher to 



xxviii 



INTRODUCTION. 



confess that the Church was right, though the earth did 
still move ; it has taught that religion was chiefly to 
save mankind from the wrath of God in the next world, 
not to bless us here on earth. 

The Christian churches neglect the evils of their 
own time. To judge from the publications that have 
been sent forth by the American churches in the last 
twenty years, — the tracts of the Orthodox, Baptists, 
Methodists, Unitarians, — what would a stranger sup- 
pose was the great sin of America at this day ? He 
might read them all through and scarcely conjecture 
that there was a drunkard in the land ; he would never 
think there was any political corruption in the country ; 
he would suppose we had most of all to fear from 
" doubt of theological doctrines ; " he would not ever 
dream that there were as many slaves in America to- 
day as there are church-members. Why is this ? Be- 
cause the churches have concluded that it is the func- 
tion of religion to save the soul from the wrath of 
God ; not to put down great sins here on earth, and 
make mankind better and men better off. These mis- 
takes are the reason why the Christian Church is in this 
process of decay. 

It does not appear that Jesus of Nazareth separated 
his thought from the new Science of the age, and said 
" Do not think ; " or that he separated his religion from 
the new Morality of the age, and said, " Never reform 
a vice, oh ! ye children of the Kingdom ! " He laid his 
axe at the root of the sinful tree and sought to hew it 



INTRODUCTION. 



xxix 



down. With him the problem was to separate relig- 
ious ideas and life from organizations that would not 
admit of a new growth ; to put his new wine into new 
bottles. With Luther there was the same problem. 
He endeavored to make new ecclesiastical raiment for 
mankind, tired of attempts to mend and wear the old 
and ill-fitting clothes of the Church which became only 
worse for the botching. In the present time there is 
the same problem: to gather from the past, from the 
Bible, from the Catholic and Protestant churches, from 
Jew and Gentile, Buddhist, Brahman, and Mahometan, 
every old truth which they have got embalmed in their 
precious treasuries ; and then to reach out and upwards 
towards God, and get every new truth that we can, and 
join all these together into a whole of theological truth 
— then to deepen the consciousness of God in our 
own soul, and make the Absolute Religion the daily 
life of men. 

Let the word Philosophy stand for the whole sum of 
human knowledge, and be divided into five great de- 
partments, or sciences, namely : Mathematics, treating 
of quantity and the relations thereof ; Physics, includ- 
ing a knowledge of the statical, dynamical, and vital 
forces of matter, — mechanics, chemistry, and physiol- 
ogy in its various departments, as it relates to the struc- 
ture and action of the material world as a whole, or to 
any of its several parts, mineral, vegetable, or animal ; 

c* 



XXX 



INTRODUCTION. 



History, embracing the actions of man in all his internal 
complexity of nature and in all his external complica- 
tions of movement, individual or collective ; Psycholo- 
gy, which includes all that belongs to human conscious- 
ness, instinctive, reflective, and volitive — intellectual, 
moral, affectional, and religious ; and Theology, which 
treats of God and his relations to matter and man. 

The progressive welfare of man demands a free de- 
velopment in all these five departments of activity. All 
these sciences are equally the productions of the human 
spirit and equally amenable to the mind of man, which 
collects, classifies, and studies both facts of observation 
and of consciousness. 

To make a special application of this doctrine — the 
religious welfare of man requires, as its condition, free- 
dom to study the facts of observation and conscious- 
ness, and to form such a scheme of Mathematics and 
Physics, of History, Psychology, and Theology, as 
will correspond to his general spiritual development 
and his special religious development. If a man, a na- 
tion, or mankind, lacks this freedom and accepts such a 
scheme of these sciences as does not fit his spiritual, or 
religious condition, then there is a contradiction in his 
consciousness ; and there is no peace until he has cast 
out the discordant element and so established unity. 

At the present day in Protestant Christendom, philos- 
ophers study the first four disciplines with entire free- 
dom. No mathematician feels bound to stop where 
Archimedes, Newton, or La Place, finished Ms career ; 



INTRODUCTION. 



xxxi 



no naturalist checks his steeds at the goal set up by 
Von Buch, or Hippocrates ; the historians and meta- 
physicians voyage beyond the Hercules' Pillars of Thu- 
cydides and Aristotle, not fearing to sail the seas with 
God. It is universally admitted by the students of 
truth that all these sciences are progressive, amenable 
to perpetual revision ; and that in all of them the hu- 
man mind is the final umpire. The inquirer looks for 
the facts, then* law, their meaning, and their use. There 
is no artificial norm established beforehand to which 
the mathematician, naturalist, historian, or metaphysi- 
cian must make all things agree. There is no Pro- 
crustes' bed in any of these four sciences whereon to 
torture ideas. 

In Catholic countries the case is often different ; the 
Roman Church hinders the progress of each of these 
sciences — even the Mathematics so far as that treats 
of the relation of quantities, as the Earth and Sun 
for example — by prohibiting freedom of thought and 
speech ; this Church has established its own artificial 
norm, the standard measure of all science. 

In Protestant countries, it is commonly thought, or at 
least alleged, that Theology is an exception to the gen- 
eral rule which controls the other sciences ; that it is 
not progressive, not amenable to perpetual revision ; 
therein the human mind is not the final umpire ; that it 
is a divine science, the facts not derived from human 
observation and consciousness, but miraculously com- 
municated to man. Accordingly, the men who control 



xxxii 



INTRODUCTION. 



the Popular Theology and occupy most of the pulpits 
of these countries, accept an old system of opinions 
which does not correspond to the general consciousness 
of enlightened men at this day. This obsolete Theol- 
ogy is set up either as religion itself, or else as the in- 
dispensable condition of religion. Thus the religious, 
the moral, and indeed the general spiritual development 
of mankind, is much retarded. Nay the theologians 
often claim eminent domain over the other sciences, 
insisting that the naturalist, the historian, and the meta- 
physician shall conform to their artificial standard and 
interpret facts of observation and of consciousness so as 
to correspond with their whimsical dreams ; so that now 
the greatest obstacle which lies in the way of human 
progress is the Popular Theology. 

In the time of Jesus and Paul the spiritual progress 
of mankind was hindered by the theological conclu- 
sions and ritual forms of previous generations. "What 
was the result of hard thinking and manifold effort on 
the father's part was accepted by the sons as a foregone 
conclusion, as a Finality in religion. So the sons in- 
herited their father's thought, but not his thinking, and 
made his religious form the substitute for religious life 
on their own part. If we sum up the theologies and 
rituals of ante- Christian antiquity in two words, we 
may say that at the time of Jesus and Paul Heathen- 
ism and Hebraism hindered the spiritual development 
of mankind. The wheels of the human chariot, deep 
in a rut, had reached the spot where the road ended ; 



INTRODUCTION. 



xxxiii 



the wheels must be lifted out, and a new highway 
made ready, reaching further on. The religious prob- 
lem of the human race then was to separate the human 
spirit from the Mistakes and Errors and Sins of the 
past, and fiirnishing itself with all the good of old 
times, to press forward to new triumph. The old bot- 
tles were empty, there must be new wine, and that put 
in new bottles. The attempt to solve this problem was 
the greatest revolution which the world ever saw. 
What destruction was there of the old ! The flame 
of old mythologies, burning to ashes, licked at the stars 
of heaven. "What construction was there also ! The 
" Christian Theology" and the " Christian Church" are 
the most remarkable organization of thoughts and men 
which the world has ever seen. 

At this day the civilized world is divided into five 
great world-sects having each a special Form of Re- 
ligion, all of Caucasian origin, coming either from the 
Sanscrit or the Hebrew stock, — the Brahmans, the 
Buddhists, the Jews, the Mahometans, and the Chris- 
tians. They are now in a state of territorial equilib- 
rium, neither gains much upon the other by means of 
theological conversion. Soon after the death of Buddha, 
Jesus, and Mahomet, then respective Forms of Religion 
spread with great rapidity. For many centuries there 
has been no national conversion. In three hundred 
years Christendom probably has not converted as many 



xxxiv 



INTRODUCTION. 



thousand Heathens to its own mode of belief. The 
Christians conquer, they do not convert, the barbarians 
in either hemisphere. « 

These five great world-sects embrace perhaps eight 
hundred million men ; and with them Theology, where 
studied at all, is commonly studied in fetters. Just now 
the spiritual progress of the world is most promoted 
by the Christians. This comes partly from the superi- 
ority of their Form of Religion ; but partly also from 
the youth and superior vigor of the leading nations of 
Christendom. But here also the progressive power is 
quite unequally distributed. Christendom is broken 
into three great sects, namely, the Greek, the Latin, 
and the Teutonic churches. 

I. The Greek Church finds most of its followers in 
the Greek and Sclavonic nations, and thus serves to 
unite the oldest and the newest families of Chris- 
tendom. 

The Greeks, the sad remnants of a nation long since 
decayed, have now little influence on the religious de- 
velopment of the world. For a thousand years past' 
the descendants of the Basils and Cyrils, of Chrysos- 
tom and Athanasius, of Origen and the Clements, have 
done nothing for the religious, or intellectual, advance 
of Christendom. Genius flees from nations in their 
dotage and decay. At present the Greeks seem to find 
no contradiction in their consciousness between the 
theological doctrines of their church and the religious 



INTRODUCTION. 



XXXV 



instincts, or intellectual convictions, of the individual 
Christian. They are unproductive, generating no new 
religious sentiments, no new theological ideas. Too far 
gone to be conservative, they do not even reproduce the 
works of the ancient masters of Christian thought or 
Christian feeling. Athanasius would be more a stranger 
in his own Alexandria than in any city of the west. 
Chrysostom is better known at Berlin than Byzantium. 
The churches which once boasted that they had " the 
chairs of the Apostles " are now indebted to the charity 
of London and Boston for the Epistles of Paul and 
James, even for common benches to sit on. Even the 
manuscripts of the Bible and of the Fathers have fol- 
lowed the Star of Empire which stands still in the west. 
Superstition takes the place of genius ; and doting 
Greece seems as incapable of intellectual and religious 
originality as of political freedom. There is an old age 
of nations as of men. Most intellectual of nations, 
the golden mouths of Homer and Chrysostom were fed 
at her bosom ; Socrates and Aristotle, Origen and 
Athanasius are her children. She has rocked the classic 
and Christian civilization in her cradle. Let the world's 
benediction fall on that aged head. 

The Slavonic population is not yet far enough ad- 
vanced in civilization to have any influence on the 
Theology of Christendom. Some of this stock are 
members of the Latin church ; the vast majority are of 
the Greek communion. To these sixty, or eighty 



xxxvi 



INTRODUCTION. 



million men the Czar is an incarnate God. He is their 
living Law, their living Gospel too, superior to all con- 
stitutions of the state ; to all traditions, written, or only 
remembered, of the church ; to all aspirations and intui- 
tions of the individual man ; amenable only to the dag- 
ger of the assassin. In theological and military affairs 
he commands with equal audacity ; and with the same 
submissiveness his slaves obey. His will is alike the 
standard for the length of the priest's beard, the fusee 
of the canon, and the doctrines of the catechism. He 
is the universal norm of faith and practice, the great 
fugleman of the Sclavonic family, sixty or eighty 
millions strong. Oriental fatalism preponderates in 
the immovable Russian church. There is a mechanical 
adherence to the Byzantine forms of worship. The old 
ritual is retained, the old symbol respected. But the 
nation has not philosophical curiosity enough to study 
and comprehend the old, nor historical interest suffi- 
cient to republish, or read, the ancient masters of its 
own church ; still less instinctive religious life enough 
to produce new sentiments in the form of mysticism, 
new ideas in the shape of dissentient Theology, or new 
actions in the guise of fresh, original morality. With 
the people, the ceremonies of the church and obedience 
to the Czar, pass for religion ; with the small class of 
educated men the cold negations of the French mind 
in the eighteenth century, are taken for philosophy. 
The nation is still sunk in semi-barbarism. Here and 
there a few great minds, like the rivers of the empire, 



INTRODUCTION. 



xxxvii 



emerge from this swamp and sweep on in grand majes- 
tic course. There is probably but little contradiction 
between the religious instinct of the people and the 
ecclesiastical forms imposed thereon. There is no new, 
normal Russian Science — Mathematics, Physics, His- 
tory, Psychology, — to conflict with the abnormal The- 
ology inherited from Byzantium. The chief character- 
istics of the Russian church are Czarism and Immobil- 
ity — it is so steadfast that it never seems to stir. But 
let no man mistake — there is no stillness to a young 
nation's mind, the root grows underground before the 
blade appears. In time of peace Russia controls Eu- 
rope by her diplomacy, in time of war by her bayonets. 
When she cannot win a battle she can buy the result 
of victory. Doubtless these expectant conquerors of 
Europe, — nay, its present masters, — will one day have 
a religious consciousness of their own, with sentiments, 
ideas, and actions new and original. When Caesar and 
Tacitus wrote of the Germans, who foresaw the Luthers 
and Schleiermachers that were to come ? Nay, in the 
time of Henry the Eighth, subtle Erasmus knew noth- 
ing of the religious America soon to be born of that 
English mother. 

II. The Latin Church includes a small part of the 
Sclavonic tribes in the north of Europe ; the Celtic in 
Ireland and Scotland; a portion of the Teutonic in 
Germany, Switzerland, and the Low Countries; and 

D 



xxxviii 



INTRODUCTION. 



the Romanic tribes in the south and west of Europe — 
the Italo-Romans, the Hispano-Romans, and the Gallo- 
Romans — with their descendants in America and other 
quarters of the globe. A few other disciples of the 
Latin church are scattered up and down the world, but 
they may be neglected in a sketch so brief as this. 

The Sclavonic, Celtic, and Hispano-Romanic mem- 
bers of the Latin church, at present, exercise no con- 
siderable spiritual influence on the world. They affect 
Christendom chiefly by their brute numbers and brute 
work. The Celtic and Spanish populations are plainly 
in a state of decay ; they can only look back with pride 
to the days when Ireland and Spain were the intel- 
lectual gardens of Europe ; or forward to the time when 
the remnants of those once famous tribes shall mingle 
their blood with the fresh life of other families still vig- 
orous with new fire, and so shall add their tribute to 
the great stream of humanity now spreading so rapidly 
over the western continent and the islands of the sea. 
The impotence of the Hispano-Romanic population 
has been demonstrated by the experience of the last 
three hundred years. Both Europe and America are 
witnesses to the sad fact. When Germany invented 
the printing-press, Spain set up the inquisition. Dr. 
Faustus and Torquemada are types of the two nations. 
Spain has not added a thought to the world's conscious- 
ness since Ferdinand and Isabella, by the butchery of 
their subjects, won from the Pope the title of " Catho- 



INTRODUCTION. XXXIX 

lie." In America the Spanish families have spread 
only as the simoon in Africa, bringing storm and deso- 
lation. The Theology of the Latin church is a curse 
in South America and Mexico. Loving the Inquisition 
it hates the printer and the schoolmaster : but like the 
ruins of Persepolis it retains the great sculpture of 
ancient times. 

Italy is Catholic in name and form. But the Italians 
and the Greeks present us the same spectacle, with a 
difference only in the degree of national decay ; a Tar- 
tar troop has subjugated Greece ; Romanic Turks rule 
Italy in her decline, the dissolution not so .complete as 
yet. Four great Italian navigators made America 
known to the world. But the continent slipped through 
the fingers of Italy. Genoa, Florence, Venice own not 
an inch of American Soil. The tongue of Columbus 
and Cabot is not the language of a town in the new 
world. There is no Italian church in the western hem- 
isphere : yet New York has better Italian newspapers 
than Rome or Naples, Florence or Venice. Italy has 
added little to the world's thought since a Roman Pope 
forced Galileo to crouch and deny the movement of the 
world ; " and yet it moves," leaving Pope and Rome 
and Italy behind. Martin Luther fled out of the " Chris- 
tian Capital," disgusted with the heathenism he saw. 
Italy affects the world by her past history, by her an- 
cient art, and her literature of beauty. The prestige of 
the proud city has still a charm for Christian and for 



xl 



INTRODUCTION. 



cultured men. The works of Leonardo, Angelo, 
Raphael, Domenichino, Titian, — when will they die? 
The laurels of Dante, Petrarch, and Tasso lose not 
a leaf; what thunder shall scorch the crown on the 
brows of Lucretius and Virgil, or blast the beauty of 
the Horatian muse ? Rome, the widow of two civili- 
zations, sits there on the shore of the Tiber, sad, yet 
magnificently beautiful ; she bears in her bosom the 
relics of heathen and Christian martyrs, but with atheis- 
tic feet tramples the ashes of her own victims, martyrs 
not less noble. The dust of Arnaldo da Brescia, and 
of many a noble soul, yet cries out of the Tiber against 
her. Ignoble sons, a populace of priests, at her feet 
consume their bread. Austria and France court and 
insult her by turns. The Queen-Mother, she has lost 
her power. 

Yet piety still treads the aisles of the Italian church : 
but alas, it is the mediaeval piety which tolls bells, fasts, 
sings antique psalms with a half manly voice, prays, 
and gives alms, but dares not think, nor work, nor do 
justly and walk manly with its God. Popeism is to 
Italy what Czarism is to Russia — only the Italian 
more thoughtful hates the hand that rules. 

In the educated classes scepticism seems chiefly to 
prevail ; the negations of the French and English Phi- 
losophers of the last century. Able men reproduce the 
thoughts of Aristotle and Aquinas. The bold voice of 
German philosophy is echoed from the Sorbonne at 
Paris, and a feeble note of the echo reaches the domos 



INTRODUCTION. 



Xli 



of Italy. Little new philosophy gets spoken there. 
Who supposes the educated clergy believe the Theology 
they profess, or trust the ritual and sacrament which 
they administer ? It is plain there is a contradiction in 
the consciousness of the Italian church. There seems 
a negation of the substance of religion, and an affirma- 
tion of only its form. Italy does nothing to advance 
the Theological Science of the world, or to diffuse a 
fairer form of religion amongst mankind ; the Roman 
Church, the mediaeval Nightmare of the Caucasian 
race, presses her in her sleep. Shall the Teutonic race 
spread over Italy, as the Sclavonic over Greece ; the 
" Barbarian " possess those crops of ancient art ? Who 
can say what shall succeed an effete race of men ? 

In the ecclesiastical condition of France there is the 
same wavering to and fro, which has long distinguished 
all the action of this Gallo-Romanic people. Since the 
Reformation, her course has been fearfully inconsistent ; 
the Protestant Theology came to France in the form of 
Calvinism. The political character of that form of 
religion, so inimical to royalty and all centralization of 
power, made it hateful to the monarchic politicians, 
even Francis the First regarding it as hostile "to all 
monarchy, divine or human;" its severe morality, its 
devout earnestness and simplicity, were detestable to 
the wealthy nobles. But it was welcomed by the manu- 
facturing and mercantile classes, and gained for a time 
such privileges as even Catholicism did not possess. 

D * 



xlii 



INTRODUCTION. 



But the Protestant star set in a sea of blood. Now 
France is more ultramontane in its character than ever 
since the days of Chancellor Gerson. In all things the 
nation fluctuates : now with loud acclaim the public 
declare the unalienable Rights of Man and seek to 
build thereon a Human State ; then, with acclamations 
yet louder, they welcome a despotism. One day they 
deify a courtezan as Goddess of Reason, then turn and 
worship the Pope, and enthrone Louis Napoleon as 
Emperor. 

At this day France seems to reproduce the phe- 
nomena of the Lower Empire. Paris is a modern By- 
zantium — the period of decadence appears to have 
begun. But there is intellectual activity, profound, 
various, and versatile ; no nation had ever such talent 
for clearness of sight, accuracy of discrimination, and 
attractive nicety of statement. Not bewildered as the 
Germans by the refinement of subtlety, the French 
mind sees and reports the real distinctions however nice. 
But no nation has a mere divided consciousness. 
Catholicism is the religion of the State ; with the 
wealthy and educated classes of men it seems to be 
only a state-religion, a mere spectacle, as remote from 
their convictions as the heathenism of Rome from the 
mind of Cicero and Csesar. The priests forget the 
lessons of Bossuet and are Roman rather than Gallic, 
so mediaeval in their tendencies. But the philosophers 
— the historians, naturalists, metaphysicians, economists, 
— what is their religion ? The two extremes of specu- 



INTRODUCTION. 



xliii 



lation are united in the consciousness of the nation, 
which accepts alike Helvetius and Thomas a Kempis. 
France does nothing to remove the contradiction from 
the mind of Christendom ; nay, she increases the trouble 
by developing each extreme. The " Eclectic Philos- 
ophy " of modern France does not appear as yet in the 
Theology of this most elastic nation. 

Yet at this time France has a great influence on the 
mind of Christendom. The powerful Catholic party 
reprints the old masters of thought, expounds the his- 
tory of times gone by, not forgetful that scholasticism — 
which sought to reconcile the history of the Church 
with the nature of man — was borne in her bosom. 
Catholic France has more intellectual life than all the 
other Romanic races, and does great service to man- 
kind. Abelard and Descartes were her children. But 
alas, her theological function is only conservative, not 
creative, not even critical. The clean and the unclean 
are equally taken into her ark, and equally honored 
while there. 

The philosophical party influence the world by their 
science, history, and letters ; the rich wine of Germany 
is here clarified, decanted, and made ready for popular 
use. But enlightened France does not study Theology. 
Few important works in that science have got printed 
there since the " Great Encyclopedia " made its appear- 
ance and smote theology to the ground. The Bible is 
printed in France as in England ; it is studied in Ger- 
many. The philosophers do little to mediate between 



xliv 



INTRODUCTION. 



Scepticism — which stops with d'Holbach, or Voltaire 
— and Superstition which seeks to believe what is im- 
possible and because it is impossible. It is a strange 
phenomenon that there should be a u new advent of 
the Virgin Mary" in France at the same time M. 
Comte publishes his " System of Positive Philosophy," 
making " a new Supreme Being " out of the mass of 
men, all of them deemed merely mortal ! The old de- 
fences of the Popular Theology are republished ; but of 
what avail are they to men who have read Bayle and 
the Encyclopedic ? At one extreme of society, the 
Jesuits revive the theology of Thomas Aquinas ; at the 
other extreme there is the foremost Science of the age. 
Religion never fails from the heart of a nation — but 
when the Theology which is taught in the name of 
religion, and as the indispensable condition thereof, is 
at variance with the convictions of every enlightened 
man ; when it is not believed by the priests who teach 
it more than by the philosophers who will not smile at 
it, — why, the religious development of the nation is 
attended with the greatest difficulties. 

The Latin church has disciples in the Teutonic 
family — among Scandinavians, Germans, and Anglo- 
Saxons. But they are chiefly found in those countries 
where the government is most despotic, or where the 
intellectual activity of the people, even of the learned, 
is the feeblest. The cruel persecution of the Irish Cath- 
olics, so long and so systematically carried on by the 



INTRODUCTION. 



xlv 



British government, converted men and women of 
Protestant families to the faith of the patient and heroic 
sufferers. Of late years some of the most pious and 
most learned men of England — so* it seems to one at 
this distance — have gone back to the bosom of the 
Latin Church. Doubtless there is much in that church 
which the English Establishment has unwisely left be- 
hind. The relapse of English Churchmen to Catholi- 
cism shows at least that there is some life and a real 
desire for piety and religious tranquillity in that least 
Protestant of the new churches. Within twenty years 
past the Catholic Theology has had considerable in- 
fluence on the English mind. 

The Scandinavian, Dutch, and Belgic Catholics have 
little appreciable influence on the mind of Europe at 
this day. The intellectual activity of these nations 
does not appear in a Catholic form. Perhaps it would 
not be possible to mention a Catholic book published 
in these countries during the present century, which has 
had any appreciable influence on the thought or feeling 
of Europe. Yet in Belgium there is considerable relig- 
ious life; at this distance it appears the most relig- 
iously Catholic country of Europe. 

Amongst other Catholics of the Teutonic family there 
is more intellectual activity. Valuable books relating 
to Catholic Theology are published in the German 
tongue. Hebrew and Christian antiquity is carefully 
studied ; much thought goes to the exposition of the 
Scriptures, to the study of ecclesiastical history. An 



xlvi 



INTRODUCTION. 



attempt is made by able and learned men to reconcile 
the Catholic Theology of the middle ages with the most 
advanced speculations of Kant and Hegel. Among the 
German Catholics t)f the present century there are the 
honorable names of Jahn, Hug, Wessenberg, Mohler, 
Movers, Staudenmaier, and others of perhaps equal 
merit, who would be an honor to any nation. Books 
full of religious life also come up from the fresh con- 
sciousness of men, — both mystical and practical. The 
Latin Church seems to have more intellectual and 
religious life in the country of Martin Luther than else- 
where in the world. But still the new thought, the 
new feeling which controls the Teutonic population is 
far from Catholic. The new religious life — mystical 
or practical — is not Roman. The German Catholic 
movement of Ronge only weakens the Latin Church. 
Of the six eminent Catholics just named, half are 
obviously heretical ; two of them have been put in the 
Index. Intellectual activity is the deadliest foe of the 
Roman church and its mediaeval divinity. Any attempt 
to reconcile her Theology with the Science of the nine- 
teenth century must needs end, as the Scholasticism of 
the Middle Ages, in the conviction that the two are 
natural opposites. 

It is idle to suppose the Latin Church can accept any 
thing new and good from the science of these times. 
Her only strength is to stand still ; if she moves she 
must perish : " infallible," Immobility and Intolerance 
are the indispensable conditions of her existence. The 



INTRODUCTION. 



xlvii 



Protestants may learn from the Catholics as the Chris- 
tians from the Jews and the Heathens ; but it is not pos- 
sible for the Catholics to learn from the Protestants — 
more than for the Heathen, or the Hebrew, to take any- 
new truth from the Christians. 

Celtic and other disciples of the Latin Church appear 
in the portion of America settled by the Teutonic pop- 
ulation. They have influence only by their numbers 
and gregarious action. The laity are subordinate to 
the clergy, who are the lowest, the most ignorant, filthy, 
and oppressive ministers on the continent, and as else- 
where, studiously keep the people in darkness and the 
most slavish subjection. The Latin Church has lost 
none of her intolerance and despotism by removing to 
America ; learning nothing and forgetting nothing, she 
still claims the right to cut off the head of heresy with 
the sword. She only wants the power. The toothless 
old lion of the mediaeval wilderness, his claws pared 
off, roams abroad in the new world ; he journeys in 
" clippers," in steamboats, in railway cars ; looks at the 
ballot-box, the free school, the newspaper, and the Bible, 
hating them all. Now and then he roars after the 
old fashion ; but no Inquisition echoes his voice. He 
has no teeth, no claws ; is not a dangerous beast. He 
loved European Slavery; he loves also American Sla- 
very ; , and equally hates a negro and a scholar. 

A great tide of immigration sets continually to Amer- 
ica. It is chiefly Catholics who come, many pious and 
holy men among them with whom their Theology is 



xlviii 



INTRODUCTION. 



the result of conviction, at least of satisfied experience ; 
many are ignorant, low, and unfortunate men, who are 
Catholics from position, they cannot yet go alone in 
religion, and wish a priest with assumed authority to 
guide, or push, or drive them. Fear of the priest and 
of hell is the hangman's knot to hold them in order. 
But many are Catholics in Em-ope from indifference or 
from fear. In America they cease to be Catholics. If 
the immigrants from Catholic countries in the present 
century, with their descendants, amount to four mill- 
ions — a moderate estimate — then it appears that out 
of thirteen persons who were reputed Catholics in Eu- 
rope, or are actually born of such, not four remain in 
the communion of the Catholic Church of America. 

In the Latin Church as a whole, little is done to 
reconcile the actual consciousness of men with the 
traditional Theology. Scotus Erigena taught that " all 
authority which is not confirmed by right reason seems 
to be weak ; " " accordingly we must resort to reason 
first and authority afterwards." The Scholastic move- 
ment may be dated from these words, whereon Erigena 
stood wellnigh alone in his time. Now the aim of 
the Latin Church, — nay, it always has been, — is to 
subordinate Man to the Church, reason to the tradition 
of the past, or the caprice of the present : accordingly 
she does not allow her disciples to study any one of the 
sciences in the normal manner, with perfectly free indi- 
viduality of spirit. Hence she aims to control the in- 



IXTRODUCTIOX. 



xlix 



tellectual convictions of mankind, making her mediaeval 
catechism the norm of ail science. To this end she 
endeavors to keep the mass of her people uneducated, 
for " ignorance is the mother of devotion " such as she 
requires ; so she hates the tree school and the tree pulpit 
and the free press. She hampers the learned class of 
men and prohibits them from publishing their individual 
opinions ; and hinders them from reading the books 
which contain the new sentiments and ideas of the 
times. The bosom of this church feeds the most odious 
tyrannies of the age. Her clergy — with honorable 
exceptions — are the allies, the advisers, and the tools 
of the tormentor ; and deserve the scorn and loathing 
of the people whom they deceive, beguile, and oppress. 
The name of Jesuit in all countries has won a repu- 
tation which no class of men ever had before. In 
America, the managers of the Catholic pulpits, with 
their subordinates, favor the most iniquitous measures 
of Spanish cruelty, or of our own Anglo-Saxon hard- 
heartedness. It is sad to see the well-meaning, but 
ignorant, disciples of this church in America exploitered 
by a twofold jesuitry — Romish priests unfeignedly 
despotic, and American politicians pretending to democ- 
racy. But I doubt not there are in the United States 
individual priests of sound learning, of true and beauti- 
ful philanthropy, of natural piety. Some have been 
born here, others have found in republican and protes- 
tant America the asylum which the old world could 
not offer. In Europe there are many such scattered 



1 



INTRODUCTION. 



abroad in the humble offices of the Church. Nay, 
sometimes they find their way to a lofty place. Such 
men in a Church which suits their consciousness break 
the bread of humanity from house to house. Long 
after Christianity became one of the religions of the 
world there were truly religious men and women who 
found rest for their souls in Hebraism or Heathenism, 
in the faith of their fathers. 

The last great sect may be called the Teutonic 
Church, distinguished by its Protest against some of 
the doctrines of both its predecessors. Catholicism is 
the religion of the Romanic families of Christendom ; 
Protestantism of the Teutonic families. The love of 
free individuality, which has always distinguished this 
great family of men, began its opposition to the Latin 
Church more than six hundred years ago. From Dutch 
Peter of Bruis, in the twelfth century, to Swabian Dr. 
Strauss in the nineteenth, the most powerful religious 
opponents of the ancestral Theology of Christendom 
have been of the Teutonic stock. Even the French 
anti- Catholicism of the last century was of English 
origin and went over the channel to make its fortune. 

Protestants there are of other families scattered about 
in all corners of Christendom. But those of the Scla- 
vonic and Ugrian families in the East of Europe, of 
the various Eomanic tribes in the South and West, 
have now little influence on the mind of Christendom, 



INTRODUCTION. 



li 



and may be neglected in this brief sketch. But the ser- 
vices of those tribes, in the cause of religious freedom, 
should not be forgot. The world ought to remember 
that, spite of ethnological diversities, human nature is 
still the same, loving the true, the beautiful, the just, 
the holy, and the good ; that Jesus and Paul were 
Jews ; that Origen was an Alexandrian Greek ; that 
Pelagius was a Celt ; that Spain bore Servetus in her 
bosom ; that France was the mother of John Calvin ; 
that Italy gave birth to Occhino, the Socini, and many 
of their kin ; that John Huss and Jerome of Prague, 
though lighting their lamps at a" Teutonic spark, were 
yet of another family ; that Sclavonians in Poland, and 
Mongol Ugrians in Transylvania afforded sympathy 
and shelter to men who fled thither, centuries ago, with 
the Ark of the Covenant of religious freedom in their 
hands. Still the territorial home of religious freedom in 
modern times, and the eminent love of free individuality 
in religion belong distinctively to the various tribes of 
the Teutonic family. They may be divided as before 
into Scandinavians, Germans, and Anglo-Saxons. 

The religious sentiments and theological doctrines of 
the Scandinavians have little influence on the spiritual 
development of the other nations of Christendom at 
present ; and so in this sketch they may be passed by, 
not without gratitude for the obstinate heroism which 
went from the North with Gustavus Adolphus and 
secured existence to Protestantism in the centre of Eu- 



Hi 



INTRODUCTION. 



rope when Jesuitism and royalty clutched at its life. 
The Germans and Anglo-Saxons require further and 
extended notice : for one of them is the most specula- 
tive and scientific, and the other is the most practical 
people that can be found anywhere in the history of 
mankind ; and both have a deep and wide influence on 
the affairs of Christendom at this day. 

In Germany the natural religiousness of the people 
has been much hindered by the political circumstances 
of the several States. The frequent wars that since the 
days of John Huss have disturbed the land, which is the 
battle field in the long contest between ancient bondage 
and modern freedom ; the oppressive character of the 
local governments ; the ecclesiastical routine, estab- 
lished by the State and enforced with the bayonet ; the 
restrictions of industry in many forms — all tend to hin- 
der the development of religion in the people, and still 
more in the most enlightened classes of the nation. 
But serious and most profound and most varied at- 
tempts have been made by this people to reconcile hu- 
man consciousness with the traditional Theology of the 
Christian Church. In some Universities Theology is 
studied with the same freedom as the other sciences. 
Germany is the only country of Christendom where this 
Queen-mother of Science is treated with such respect. 
Paul and Jesus are regarded as men, not as babies. 
The mind of the Germans has some qualities well fit- 
ted to solve the theological problems of the age. In- 



INTRODUCTION. 



liii 



tuitive to a great degree, as their originality in many 
departments abundantly proves ; deeply religious by 
nature as the ante- Christian modes of worship made 
plain to Roman Tacitus, and as the mysticism of the 
nation has shown ever since the days of Saint Boni- 
facius ; creative and imaginative as no other nation has 
ever been, — a fact proven by the wide spread and char- 
acteristic national music, by the rich and various litera- 
ture of the educated, and still more by the legends and 
songs, the wild flowers of imagination, which have 
sprung up from the bosom of the people, as the Forget- 
me-not, the Violet, the Daisy, and manifold Heaths from 
their meadows and mountains, for the creative imagina- 
tion seems as universal in the people as the plastic 
forms of vegetation in Nature ; laborious and patient, 
so that their scholars are the most numerous and 
learned that the human race ever bore ; cosmopolitan 
and universal to a degree not deemed possible to the 
ancient Greeks, counting nothing unclean because it is 
common, nothing inaccessible because lofty and hard to 
come by, and nought barbarian however foreign ; sub- 
tle in discrimination ; nice in analysis of facts of obser- 
vation and still more of facts of consciousness ; of great 
power to generalize, often running to excess ; with a 
natural or acquired tendency to the world of thoughts 
and feeling rather than to the details of commerce and 
art ; with a language so pliant that it takes any form 
which the human mind needs for its most various pur- 
poses of intellectual advancement, inferior only to the 

E * 



liv 



INTRODUCTION. 



ancient Greek, — it seems that the Germans are singu- 
larly fitted to solve the theological problems of the 
world. All the new theological thought of Christendom 
for the last three hundred years has come from some 
tribe of this great Teutonic family. The Roman State 
was broken by Saxon Herman ; the Roman Church by 
Saxon Luther on the same " red earth " of Germany. 
In vain Rome cried " Give me back Varus and his 
legions ; " in vain " Give me back my infallible Pope 
and his Indulgences." Germany broke with Rome. 
The nation which invented Gunpowder and the Print- 
ing-Press demanded free individuality of spirit in mat- 
ters of religion. 

Since Luther's time, and long before it, the German 
mind has studied Theology devoutly and manfully. 
The interference of government has indeed checked 
both religious feeling and theological speculation ; it 
has prevented neither. Free thought, however, has not 
found any general expression in the pulpit, but in the 
colleges ; it speaks by the iron lips of the press, not the 
living tongue of the preacher ; it is addressed to the 
learned, not the people. So while the Shepherd has 
revelled in intellectual plenty with all the corn of 
whole Egypts at his command, the flock has grazed 
in scanty parish-commons, waterless and brown, or 
browsed on Theology, on dry and leafless catechisms. 
The learned philosopher must preach what the un- 
learned kings command ; he may think, and print for 
the army of scholars, what heresy he will. The result 



INTRODUCTION. 



Iv 



has been a sad one for the shepherd and the flock, the 
philosopher and the kings. 

The great army of theological scholars in Germany 
may be divided into two grand divisions, namely : the 
Biblicists who make the Scriptures the norm and stand- 
ard measure of Religion, Theology and all which per- 
tains thereto ; and the Philosophers, who make the hu- 
man Spirit the standard measure in Theology as in all 
science, in religious, as in aesthetic, ethical, or afTectional 
affairs. 

Each of these parties, the Biblicists and the Philoso- 
phers, may be again divided into two brigades : namely, 
the Supernaturalists who believe in miracles, and the 
Naturalists who reject miracles ; and each brigade into 
its Right Wing and its Left Wing ; each of these into 
an Extreme Right and Extreme Left. So in this theo- 
logical host there are the Biblicists and Philosophers, 
made up of biblical Naturalists and biblical Supernat- 
uralists, and of philosophical Naturalists and philo- 
sophical Supernaturalists ; with then Extreme Right 
and Extreme Left. In the line of Christians, for mas- 
tery of the world battling face to face against the great 
antagonistic sects — Brahmans and Buddhists, Jew^s, 
Mahometans, and Heathens, — the Biblicists stand next 
to the Catholics, the Extreme Right of the Biblical 
Supernaturalists touching the Left Wing of the Latin 
Church. The Philosophical Naturalists are at the 
opposite end of this German army, their Extreme Left 
bordering, not distinguishably, upon Atheists and oth- 
ers of like sort. 



Ivi 



INTRODUCTION". 



All phases of Christian speculation and Christian 
feeling are reproduced, examined, and judged by this 
army of students. The air rings with the thunder of 
the captains and the shouting. The ground is cum- 
bered with the missiles — historical, exegetical, philo- 
logical, philosophical, mystical — which are cast at the 
other sects, at the Catholics, and still more at each 
other. But to drop the military metaphor — a serious 
attempt is making in Germany to study Theology as a 
Science, with freedom and impartiality. Mistakes and 
Errors must needs be made. Many Sins also will be 
and are, doubtless, committed, but much truth comes to 
light. Some writers affirm the absolute truth of every 
word in the Bible ; others deny the immortality of the 
soul and the existence of God, and demand the " Re- 
habilitation of the Flesh in its aboriginal supremacy 
over the spirit of man." 

Not to dwell on the monstrous tyranny now exercised 
by the government in some parts of Germany, to one 
at this distance there appear three difficulties in the 
way of the German Protestant churches ; namely, the 
great mass of the people are not even spectators to the 
controversy, for the difference of culture between the 
scholar and the practical man is so great that the two 
are incomprehensible to each other. Then the scholars, 
in consequence partly of their seclusion from the people 
and of then unpractical character, use such vague 
terms that it is often difficult to apprehend their mean- 
ing; subtler than Athenian and Alexandrian Greeks, 



INTRODUCTION. 



Ivii 



nice as the quibbling schoolmen of the Middle Ages, 
they seem often entangled in their own intricate phrase- 
ology. Again, they are intellectual and speculative 
more than ethical and practical. 

But spite of these faults Christendom owes a great 
obligation to the German Scholars of the last seventy 
years, not to mention the noble men who preceded 
them, for the services they have rendered mankind by 
exploring the depths of human consciousness and ex- 
pounding the past history of the race. The immoral 
and atheistical philosophers are but exceptions to the 
general rule. In the breaking up of old dogmas there 
is always much abnormal action ; a revolution is a 
turning over and over. 

The Anglo-Saxons are a burly-minded race of men ; 
more ethical than imaginative, artistic, or philosophi- 
cal, they are the most practical people at this day in all 
Christendom. With consummate skill to organize 
things into machines, and men into industrial States, 
they have now the same controlling force in the practi- 
cal affairs of the Teutonic nations, — yes, of Christen- 
dom, — which the Germans have in the world of pure 
thinking. The Anglo-Saxon loves things ; the German 
thoughts. The one symbolizes his individuality by a 
visible hedge about his field, distinguishing it from his 
neighbor's property ; the other by some peculiar Idea 
of his own ; one conquers new lands, accumulates 
material riches, and founds States ; the other conquers 
ideas, accumulates vast intellectual treasures and 



Iviii 



INTRODUCTION. 



founds Systems of Philosophy and Theology. The 
Anglo-Saxon is singularly direct, simple, and devoid of 
subtlety ; his mind, his language, and his government, 
are distinguished for plainness and simplicity — for ab- 
sence of complication. He seizes things by their great 
relations, and seldom understands the nicer complica- 
tions which are so attractive to the Germans. This 
simplicity appears also in the metaphysical systems of 
the Anglo-Saxons, and in their Theology. There are 
numerous sects in their churches ; but they depend on 
obvious and palpable differences, not on nice and ab- 
struse distinctions. The sects differ in the form of 
church-government — by Bishops, by Elders, or the 
People; in the form of the ritual — baptizing in baby- 
hood, or in manhood, from a porringer or a pond ; in 
the arithmetic of deity — considering the Godhead as 
one person, or as more than one ; in the damnation, or 
salvation of mankind. These and similar differences, 
easily comprehended by any one who can count his 
fingers, are the matters on which the Anglo-Saxons 
divide into sects. The subtle questions which vexed 
the Greeks in the Patristic age, the Italians and Celts 
in the Scholastic age, or the modern Germans in the 
Critical age, seldom disturb the sturdy and straight- 
forward intellect of the English and Americans, intent 
on the ultimatum of practice, not the process of specu- 
lation. 

This great tribe of the Teutonic family — distributed 
into English and Americans — is just now in a quite 



INTRODUCTION. 



lix 



interesting period of spiritual development. It has 
accepted the traditional Theology of the Christian 
Church with various superficial modifications ; has 
taken pains not to improve this Theology, deeming 
it not susceptible of improvement, not amenable to the 
mind of man. And it has now come to such a pass 
that there is a plain and painful contradiction between 
the Popular Theology and the consciousness of en- 
lightened men. 

In England the majority of the people are doubtless 
open dissenters from the Established Church. It is not 
easy to estimate the amount of secret dissent in that 
Church itself, or of private disgust at the Popular 
Theology in the ranks of professing dissenters. But 
to judge from the scientific, the historical, and the 
aesthetic literature of England for the past twenty 
years, and from the avidity with which profound trea- 
tises that show the insufficiency of this Theology have 
been received, it is plain that the mind of that country 
no longer accepts the Theology of the churches. The 
negations of both the biblical and philosophical Nat- 
uralists of Germany, have had a rather silent, but 
apparently a profound influence on the theological 
opinions of the nation. Eminent talent seldom ap- 
pears in her churches — established, or dissenting. 
They are not the centres of religious life. Valuable 
institutions, as a whole, to keep the average men from 
falling back ; valuable to urge some of the hindmost 
men forward, they yet do not lead the nation in philan- 



Lx 



INTRODUCTION. 



thropic and religious feeling, in theological thought, or 
in moral action ; and accordingly fail of the threefold 
function of a Church. 

In America no form of religion is established by law ; 
all the world-sects, as well as all the Christian sects, are 
theoretically free and equal, subject to the same eco- 
nomical and ethical supervision of the civil power. This 
circumstance has been eminently advantageous to the 
spiritual growth of the people. No clergyman can ap- 
peal to the bayonet to enforce his feeble argument, 
or to bring hearers to his meeting-house. A few 
laws depriving men of certain civil rights if they lack 
the legal minimum of religious belief, or punishing 
them for the utterance of antichristian opinions, still 
live on the statute-book, but they are eminently excep- 
tional in this country, and fast becoming obsolete. All 
is left to the voluntary activity of the people. The im- 
mediate practical consequence has been a multiplica- 
tion of churches, of preachers, and of hearers. No 
Christian country of large extent is so well furnished 
with meeting-houses and with clergymen ; in no coun- 
try is so large a proportion of the population found in 
the churches on Sunday; nowhere is the Bible, with 
religious books and periodicals, so common, and uni- 
versally diffused. Theological Seminaries are erected 
by each denomination, and the means provided for edu- 
cating, up to the level of the nation, such talent as 
moves towards the pulpit. Each denomination takes 
great pains with the ecclesiastical training of the chil- 



INTRODUCTION. 



Ixi 



dren. Competition has the same effect in the churches 
as the market. 

The Americans have applied the first principles of 
the Cartesian method in philosophy to every thing 
except what concerns Theology and Religion. There 
they have mainly consented to walk by the old tradi- 
tions. But the difference between the old and the new, 
between the intellectual principles of the accomplished 
and philosophic lyceum-lec hirer, and those of the theo- 
logical preacher holding forth on the same theme, from 
the same desk, to the same audience, springs in the eyes 
of all. The contradiction between Theology and the 
other Sciences is seen and understood by a large class 
of intelligent men ; it is felt, but not understood, by a 
much larger class, men of genuine piety who reproach 
themselves because they doubt the miracles of the Bible 
and fail to relish the eternal damnation of men, or be- 
cause they take so little interest in the dull routine of 
what in the churches is called religion. With the wide 
spread of a very superficial intellectual culture, and 
with the immense intellectual activity brought out by 
the political institutions and the industrial movements 
of the country, a great amount of doubt on theological 
matters has also been developed. Sometimes it is pub- 
he, oftener it is secret. But it is plain that the contra- 
diction between the Theology of the churches and the 
Science, the Literature, the Philanthropy, and the Piety 
of the age, is very widely felt and pretty widely under- 
stood. 



Ixii 



INTRODUCTION. 



Clergymen endeavor to solve this contradiction in 
two ways. Men of one party attempt to put man 
down and bring him back to the old Theology. They 
deride new Piety ; they rail at new Philanthropy ; they 
decry Science ; and at each new-comer in Theology 
who puts his yeasty wine into the old bottles of the 
Church, or, still worse, into others of a newer make and 
pattern, they call out " Infidel ! Atheist ! Away with 
him ! " But they have no physical force at then com- 
mand as in continental Europe. It is almost three 
hundred years since Calvin burnt Unitarian Servetus 
alive at the stake, where now a Unitarian college 
teaches the obnoxious opinion. Quakers and Bap- 
tists are never disturbed in Boston which once shed 
the blood of the founders of these earnest and impor- 
tant sects. 

The other party, scanty in numbers, endeavors to 
bring Theology up to the level of the science of the 
times, and to engage the churches in new piety and 
new philanthropy. 

The retrogressive and the progressive party are both 
needed ; and have valuable functions to perform. 
There is always danger that some good things should 
be left behind ; and not only feeble and timid persons, 
but warworn veterans also, are therefore properly put in 
the rear of the human army marching to the promised 
land ; else baggage might be abandoned, and even 
stragglers lost. The Christians left good things behind 
in the Hebrew and Heathen cities they marched out of, 



INTRODUCTION. 



Ixiii 



or passed through ; they must send back and bring 
away all those things. The Protestants rejected much 
that was excellent, perhaps indispensable to the welfare 
of mankind ; so pious men and women must go over to 
the Latin Church and reclaim it. 

How is the Anglo-Saxon Church, with its many de- 
nominations, performing its theological and religious 
function ? Certainly not very well. As a whole it re- 
bukes no great popular Sins ; it corrects no great popu- 
lar Mistakes and Errors. The Churches of England 
and America do not rebuke the actual evils of these 
two nations ; they preach mainly against small vices 
which the controlling classes of the people have little 
temptation to commit. In England and America, the 
strong often exploiter the weak, consciously, or igno- 
rantly. The Anglo-Saxon, — whether Briton or Ameri- 
can, — has a most inordinate lust for land : he wishes 
to annex the universe to his estate. How has England 
pillaged India ; how has America plundered Mexico, 
and now goes " fillibustering " towards Cuba ! The 
commercial policy of Christian England is quite as 
selfish, and almost as cruel, as the military policy of 
Heathen Rome — abroad it aims to impoverish other 
countries, ruin their manufactures, and cripple their 
commerce, in order to heap up enormous riches in 
England ; at home it aims to concentrate great wealth, 
and its consequent power, in the hands of a few strong 
men who shall exploiter the mass of the people. The 
policy of America is to keep one seventh part of the 



Ixiv 



INTRODUCTION. 



population in such slavery as exists nowhere else in 
Christendom ; nay, more, the Christian " Barbary States 
of America " cherish the slavery which the Mahometan 
Barbary States of Africa have cast off with scorn and 
loathing. The English and American churches do not 
oppose the Sins, but encourage them. 

In the ante- Christian governments the State and the 
Church were identical, the national religion was pre- 
scribed by the national law and enforced by the sword 
of the magistrate. The function of official priests was 
to appease the wrath of God, or purchase his favor ; it 
was not to develop the spirit of the people. In Rome, 
such was the eclectic spirit of the nation, all forms of 
devotion were allowed to exist along with the national 
religion, so long as they did not disturb the peace of the 
city. But when Christianity came, affirming the unity 
of God and the falseness of all antecedent, or other, 
forms of religion, the Roman State, in preserving its 
own form of worship, must of necessity attempt to sup- 
press the Christian religion. Christianity grew up in 
opposition to the magistrate. So there were at the 
beginning two powers in the nation — the State, the 
carnal temporal power ; and the Church, — the spiritual 
power whose kingdom was " not of this world." When 
Christianity became a " lawful religion," and when it 
became the national religion, there still continued this 
division between the State and Church ; two distinct 
organizations were established, the " carnal " and the 



INTRODUCTION. 



Ixv 



" spiritual." This separation of the civil and religious 
authorities has been of great value to the world. In 
the Middle Ages, the Church was one established 
power, and the State another, each independent. The 
Church was a critic and check upon the State, the State 
upon the Church. Ecclesiastical conformity was often 
political dissent. The government of Christendom was 
monarchic ; but the monarchy was two-headed. The 
practical effect of this was important, in many respects, 
to mankind. But in the Roman States, and in all 
countries which owed exclusive civil obedience to the 
Pope the Church swallowed up the State ; the " spirit- 
ual " became also the " carnal " power, and the people 
were ruled with terrible oppression. The same result 
took place when the " carnal " became the " religious " 
power, as. it sometimes did. In both of these cases the 
monarchy became single-headed ; the State and the 
Church were merged into one ; there was no city of 
refuge for the victim of the magistrate, or of the priest, 
to fly to. If he ran from the king's axe, he fell over the 
Pope's fagot. Thus was he overtaken by one or the 
other horn of the tyrannical dilemma, and if he escaped 
beheading he was sure to be burned. In countries 
where this division of powers was recognized, the man 
fled from the court house to the temple, or from the 
temple to the court house, and humanity had a fairer 
opportunity to obtain justice. 

But when the scholastic philosophers, after strug- 
gling for centuries, had failed to reconcile the conscious- 



Ixvi 



INTRODUCTION. 



ness of mankind with the dogmas of the Church ; when 
the Church itself became corrupt in head and members, 
and the Priests of Christendom were more tyrannical 
and shameless than the magistrates of Heathendom, 
then human consciousness broke with the Roman 
Church. But the people, long accustomed to passive 
submission under the State and Church, gained ap- 
parently little by the change. The kings, or other civil 
magistrates, took possession of the spiritual power 
which in Protestant countries had been wrested from 
the hands of the Pope. Thus as the Church grew 
weak the State again grew strong, and assumed the 
same authority in matters of religion which had for- 
merly been claimed by the Pope in Christian, or by the 
king in Heathen countries. This was not effected 
without a struggle. In some countries the spiritual 
power, in carnal hands, became absolute ; in others it 
was conditioned by a constitution ; but in all the coun- 
tries of Protestant Europe the State still claims eminent 
domain over the Church, prescribes the ritual, and es- 
tablishes the creed. Thus in Prussia the kinsr demands 
that every man shall be a soldier and a church-member ; 
he is drilled in the manual exercise and the catechism. 
Even England has her national religion, and rejects 
with scorn from her two wealthy universities all who 
cannot subscribe to the contradictory formularies of 
belief: though she allows dissent, she by no means ad- 
mits the dissenters to an equality with the disciples of 
her own Church, in which the aristocratic element pre- 



INTRODUCTION. 



Ixvii 



ponderates over the popular — for the congregation is 
only of " dead-heads," which have no voice in making 
the doctrines of the Church, or even in electing its 
minister. 

In this way the Protestant Church of Europe has lost 
one of its most valuable functions — it is no longer a 
critic on the State, it is the servant and creature of the 
'State. If the magistrates are corrupt, the laws unjust 
and oppressive, the clergy dare not say a word against 
the iniquity. The Bench of Bishops is seldom found 
to be more humane than the House of Lords where it 
sits ; and the Protestant Pulpit, in these countries, takes 
special care not to rebuke any popular Error or Sin. 
So the established Church in Protestant countries is 
commonly found siding with Government and not with 
the People : it attends to the Form — the ritual and the 
creed — not to the Substance of Religion. It does not* 
demand a free mind, free conscience, free affection, and 
a tree soul, all in their normal mode of activity. 

In America there is no State-religion and no na- 
tional Church. Each denomination determines its 
creed for itself, and manages its own affairs. But such 
is the dependence of the preacher on his parish for 
pecuniary support, and so much is that thought to 
depend on servility to the controlling and wealthy 
classes of society, that any popular wickedness is pretty 
sure of the support of the greater part of the American 
clergy. This is eminently the case in the great towns 
— the seat of riches, of commercial and political power. 



lxviii INTRODUCTION. 

The minister may forget his God, his Conscience, his 
Self-respect ; he must not attempt to correct " the hand 
that feeds him." Slavery, the great sin of America, has 
long found, its most effectual support in the American 
Church. The powerful denominations are on its side, 
the Tract Society says nothing against it ; the leaders 
of the sects, with the rarest exception, are in favor of 
this wickedness. When prominent political men deny 
that there is any law of God to overrule the most 
wicked enactment of corrupt politicians, the wealthy 
churches say " Amen ! " 

In England the churches seem no better ; they can 
rebuke American, but not British Sins, as the American 
British and not their own. In the military age the 
spiritual and carnal powers were independent of each 
other, and mutual checks ; in the commercial age the 
'Spiritual depends on the carnal power for daily bread, 
and dares not offend the hand that feeds it ; forgetting 
the Eye which " seeth not as man seeth." The great 
theological movement of the Anglo-Saxons, the great 
religious movement, is not carried on by the churches 
but in spite of them. 

To sum up the theological and religious condition 
of the Protestant countries as a whole, it must be con- 
fessed that there is a great contradiction in the con- 
sciousness of the people ; that the Popular Theology is 
at variance with the other sciences, and is fading from 



INTRODUCTION, 



lxix 



the respect of the people. A great intellectual move- 
ment goes on, a great moral, philanthropic, and religious 
movement, but the preachers in the churches do little 
directly either to diffuse new truths, or to kindle a 
deeper sentiment of piety, or philanthropy. The Prot- 
estant Church, counts this its chief function — to ap- 
pease the wrath of God and to admininister the Scrip- 
tures to men, not to promote piety and morality. 

Take the whole Christian Church at this day — 
where is the vigor, the energy, the faith in God, the 
love for man, which marked the lives of those persons 
who built churches with their lives ? Taken as a whole, 
the clergy of Christendom oppose the foremost science, 
justice, philanthropy, and piety of the age. The eccle- 
siastical institutions seem to bear the same relation to 
mankind now, as the ecclesiastical institutions of the 
Hebrews and Heathens two thousand years ago. Every 
year the Science of the scholar separates him further 
and further from the Theology of the churches. The 
once united Church is rent into three. The infallibility 
of the Roman Church — who believes it? the Pope, 
the superior Catholic clergy? The Infallibility of the 
Bible, — its divine origin, its miraculous inspiration — 
do the Scholars of Christendom believe that in defiance 
of Mathematics, Physics, History, and Psychology ? 
They leave it to the clergy. The Trinity is shaken ; 
men lose their faith in the efficacy of water-baptism, 



Ixx 



INTRODUCTION. 



and other artificial sacraments, to save the souls of 
men ; miracles disappear from the belief of all but the 
clergy. Do they believe them ? The Catholic doubts 
the mediaeval miracles of his own Church ; it is in vain 
that the Virgin Mary reappears in Switzerland and 
France ; that Saint Januarius annually liquifies his 
blood ; that statues weep : the stomachs of reapers re- 
fuse such bread. It avails nothing to threaten scientific 
doubters with eternal hell. Superior talent forsakes the 
Church, — even in Catholic countries, there are few 
clergymen of genius, or even great talent. In Protes- 
tant Germany theological genius teaches in the college, 
not in the pulpit ; and with new science destroys the 
mediaeval opinions it was once set to defend. Will the 
spirit of the human race come back and reanimate the 
dry bones of dead Theology ? When the mummies of 
JEgypt shall worship again their half-forgotten gods — 
Osiris, Orus, Apis, Isis ; when mankind goes back to 
the other sciences of half-savage life the Theology of 
that period may be welcomed again. Not till then. 

Is Religion to die out of the consciousness of man ! 
Believe it not. Even the protests against " Chris- 
tianity " are oftenest made by men full of the religious 
spirit. Many of the " Unbelievers " of this age are 
eminent for then religion ; atheists are often made such 
by circumstances. Even M. Comte must have a New 
Supreme — Nouveau Grand Eire, — and recommends 
daily prayer to his composite and progressive deity ! 
There was never a time when Christendom was so 



INTRODUCTION. 



Ixxi 



pious — in love of God ; so philanthropic — in love of 
man ; so moral — in obedience to the law of God ; so 
intellectual — knowing it so well ; so rich — possessing 
such power over the material world. Yet through lack 
of a true Idea of God, from want of institutions to 
teach and apply the Absolute Religion — - there is not 
that conscious and total religious activity which is 
indispensable for the healthy and harmonious develop- 
ment of mankind. 

What need there is of a new religious life ! The 
three great public forces of the leading nations of 
Christendom, — Business, Politics, and the Press, ex- 
cite a great intellectual activity. Christendom was 
never so thoughtful as now. Shall this great movement 
of mind be unreligious, without consciousness of God ? 
It will not be controlled by the Theology of the Chris- 
tian Church. But it is not a wicked age. What phi- 
lanthropies are there new born in our time ? Catholic 
France is rich in the literature of charity, shaming the 
haughtiness of the Anglo-Saxon Church. Yet within 
not many years at what great cost has England set 
free almost a million men " owned " as slaves ! Nay, 
Russian Nicholas emancipates his serfs. Socialists 
seek to abolish poverty, and all the curses it brings on 
the body and the spirit of man. Wise men begin to 
see that the majority of criminals are the victims of 
society more than its foes, and seek to abolish the 
causes of crime ; what pains are taken with the poor, 
the crazy, the lame, the blind, the deaf, the dumb ; nay, 



lxxii 



INTKODUCTION. 



with the fool! Great men look at the condition of 
woman — and generous hearted women rise up to 
emancipate their sex. The churches are busy with 
their Theology and their ritual, and cannot attend 
much to these great humane movements ; they must 
appease the " wrath of God," or baptize men's bodies 
with water and their minds with wind. Still the work 
goes on, but without a corresponding consciousness of 
God, and connection with the religious emotions. No 
wonder Christendom seems tending to anarchy. But 
it is only the anarchy which comes of the breaking up 
of darkness. 

There must be a better form of Religion. It must 
be free, and welcome the highest, the proudest, and the 
widest thought. Its organization must not depend on 
the State ; it must ask no force to bring men to meet- 
ing, to control a man's opinions, to tell him on what 
day he shall worship, when he shall pray, what he shall 
believe, what he shall disbelieve, or what he shall de- 
nounce. 

The Christian world has something to learn, at this 
day, even from the Atheist ; for he asks entire Freedom 
for human nature, — freedom to think, freedom to will, 
freedom to love, freedom to worship if he may, not to 
worship if he will not. And if the Christian Church 
had granted this freedom there would have been no 
atheism. If Theology had not severed itself from Sci- 
ence, Science would have adorned the Church with its 
magnificent beauty. If the Christian Church had not 



INTRODUCTION. 



lxxiii 



separated itself from the world's life there would be no 
need of anti-slavery societies, temperance societies, 
education societies, and all the thousand other forms of 
philanthropic action. A new religious life can beautify- 
all these movements into one. There is one great 
truth which can do it: that God is not finite, as all 
previous forms of religion have taught, but is Infinite 
in his Power, in his Wisdom, in his Justice, in his Holi- 
ness, and in his Love. 

It is for earnest men of this age to protest against 
the evils of the Christian Church, as Luther against 
the Catholic Church, as Paul against the Heathen, as 
Jesus against the Hebrew Church. This can be done 
only by a Piety deeper, a Philanthropy wider, and a 
Theology profounder than the Church has ever known ; 
by a life which, like that of Luther, Paul, Jesus, puts 
the vulgar life of the churches all to shame. The new 
Church must gather to its bosom all the truth, the 
righteousness and beauty of the old world, and add 
other excellence new got from God. Piety must be 
applied to all daily life, to politics, to literature, to all 
business : it must be the creed which a man repeats as 
he delivers goods over his counter, repeats with his 
hands, which he works into every thing that he manu- 
factures. That is a Piety already on its way to suc- 
cess, and sure to triumph. 

There are evils which demand a religious hand to 
redress them. The slave is to be freed, the State and 
Society to be reorganized ; woman is to be elevated to 

G 



lxxiv 



INTRODUCTION. 



her natural place ; political corruption to be buried in 
its grave. Pauperism is to end, war to cease, and the 
insane lust of our times for gold and pleasure is to be 
tamed and corrected. This can be done only by a deep 
religious life in the heart of the people. All great civil- 
izations begin with God. 

It is a sad thing to look at the noble and large- 
minded men who in this century have become disgusted 
with the Popular Theology, and so have turned off 
from all Conscious Religion. In a better age they 
would have been leaders of the world's piety. It is 
for men who have sought to cut loose from every false 
tradition, to worship the Infinite Father and Infinite 
Mother! They may scold, and are then the Church 
termagant, worth nothing but their criticism. They 
may toil to remove these evils, their life making a new 
Church, and then they are the Church beneficent ; their 
influence will go into the world's life, and hasten the 
development of mankind. 

How much does all Christendom need a new Form 
of Religion, to reconcile the understanding, to bring the 
conscience, and the heart, and the soul, to the great 
work of life ! Then if men are faithful, when eighteen 
hundred other years have passed by, they will have 
produced an influence in the world's history like that of 
the great Christian apostle, who went to the Gentiles 
so poor and so obscure that no man knows of his 
whereabouts, or his whence, or his whither. Now, as 
of old, " God hath chosen the weak things of the world 



INTRODUCTION. 



Ixxv 



to confound the mighty," and the true to confound the 
false. There is no reason to fear. The Infinite God is 
perfect Cause and perfect Providence ; He made the 
universe from a perfect motive, of perfect materials, for 
a perfect purpose, and as a perfect means thereto. Shall 
He fail of his intentions ? Man marches forth to fresh 
triumphs in Religion as in Philosophy and Art. What 
is gained once is gained for all time, and for eternity. 
Hebraism, Heathenism, Christianism are places where 
Man halted in his march towards the Promised Land, 
encampments on his pilgrimage. He rests awhile ; 
then God says to him, " long enough hast thou com- 
passed this Mountain ; turn and take thy journey for- 
ward. Lo ! the Land of Promise is still before thee.' 
In the anarchy of this age are we taught to feel, 

" That man's heart is a holy thing, 

And Nature, through a world of death, 
Breathes into him a second breath, 
More searching than the breath of spring." 



SERMON I. 

ATHEISM AS THEORY. 



» 



PSALM XIV. 1. 

THE TOOL HATH SAID IN HIS HEART, THERE IS NO GOD. 
(21 



I. 



OF SPECULATIVE ATHEISM REGARDED AS A 
THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. 



On this and several following Sundays I propose to 
speak of Atheism, of the Popular Theology, and of 
pure Theism : of each first as a Theory of the Uni- 
verse, and then as a Principle of practical life ; first as 
speculative Philosophy, then as practical Ethics 

The Idea which a man forms of God is always the 
most important element in his speculative theory of the 
universe, and in his particular, practical plan of action 
for the church, the state, the community, the family, 
and his own individual life. You see to-day the vast 
influence of the popular idea of God. All the great 
historical civilizations of the race have grown out of 
the national idea which was formed of God, or have 
been intimately connected with it. The popular The- 
ology, which at first is only an abstract idea in the heads 
of the philosophers, by and by shows itself in the laws, 
the navies, the forts, and the jails ; in the churches, the 
ceremonies, and the sacraments, the weddings, the bap- 
tisms, and the funerals ; in the hospitals, the colleges, 
the schools, in all the social charities ; in the relation of 

(3) 



4 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



a husband and wife, parent and child ; in the daily- 
work and the daily prayer of each man. Thus, what at 
first is the abstractest of thoughts, by and by becomes 
the concretest of things. If a man concludes there is 
no God at all, that conclusion, negative though it is, 
will have an immense influence ; subjectively on his 
feelings and opinions, objectively on his outward con- 
duct ; subjectively as the theory of the universe ; objec- 
tively as the principle of practical life. 

Speculative Theism is the belief in the existence of 
God, in one form or another ; and I call him a Theist 
who believes in any God. By Atheism I mean abso- 
lute denial of the existence of any God. A man may 
deny actuality to the Hebrew idea of God, to the Chris- 
tian idea of God, or to the Mahometan idea of God, 
and yet be no atheist. 

The Hebrews formed a certain conception of a being 
with many good qualities, and some extraordinarily 
bad qualities, and called it Jehovah, and said, " That is 
God : it is the only God." The majority of Christians 
form a certain conception of a being with more good 
qualities than are ascribed to Jehovah, but with some 
most atrociously evil qualities, and call it Trinity, or 
Unity, and say, — " That is God : it is the only God." 

Now a man may deny the actuality of either or 
both these ideas of God, and yet be no atheist. He 
may do so because he is more of a theist than the ma- 
jority of Hebrews or Christians ; because he has a higher 
development of the religious faculty, and has thereby ob- 
tained a better idea of God. Thus the Old Testament 
prophets, with a religious development often far in ad- 
vance of their Gentile neighbors, declared, that Baal 
was no God. Of course, the worshipper of Baal called 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



5 



the Hebrew prophets atheists, for they denied all the 
God that Gentile knew. Paul, in the New Testament, 
more of a theist than the Greeks and Asiatics about 
him, with a larger religious development than they 
dreamed of, said, — " an Idol is nothing." That is, 
there is no divine being which corresponds exactly to 
the qualities ascribed to any material idol. Their idea 
of God, said Paul, lacked actuality ; it was a personal 
or national whimsey ; not a perfect subjective represen- 
tation of the objective fact of the universe ; but only a 
mistaken notion of that fact. 

If a man has outgrown the Hebrew, or common 
Christian idea of God, he may say what Paul said of 
the Idol, — " It is nothing." He will not be an atheist, 
but a theist all the more. The superior conception of 
God always nullifies the inferior conception. 

Thus as the world grows in its development, it neces- 
sarily outgrows its ancient ideas of God, which were 
only temporary and provisional. As it goes forward, 
the ancient - deities are looked on first as devils ; next as 
a mere mistaken notion which some men had formed 
about God. For example, a hundred years ago it was 
the custom of the learned men of the Christian church 
to speak of the Heathen deities, — Jupiter, Apollo, Ve- 
nus, and the rest, — as Devils. They did not deny the 
actual existence of those beings, only affirmed them to 
be not Gods but devils or " fallen angels ; " at any rate, 
evil beings. Some of the heretics among the early 
Christians said the same of the Hebrew Jehovah, that 
he was not the true God, but only a Devil who misled 
the Jews. Now-a-days well educated men who still 
use the terms, say that Jupiter, Apollo, Venus, and the 
others, were only mistaken notions which men formed 
of God. They deny the actuality of the idea ; " Jupi- 

1* 



6 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



ter is nothing." A man who has a higher conception 
of God than those about him, who denies then concep- 
tion, is often called an atheist by men who are less the- 
istic than he. Thus the Christians, who said the Hea- 
then idols were no gods, were accounted atheists by the 
people, and accordingly put to death. Thus Jesus of 
Nazareth was accused of blasphemy, and crucified by 
men who had not a tithe of the religious development 
and reverence for God which he possessed. The men 
who centuries ago denied the actuality of the Trinity, 
were put to death as atheists, — Servetus among the 
rest, John Calvin himself tending the flames. 

At this day the Devil is a part of the popular God- 
head in the common theology, representing the malig- 
nant element which still belongs to the ecclesiastical 
conception of Deity. If a man says there is no devil, 
he is thought to be, if not an atheist, at least very 
closely related to an atheist. He denies a portion of 
the popular Godhead ; is constructively an atheist ; an 
atheist as far as he goes ; atheistic in kind, as much as 
if he denied the whole Godhead, when he would obvi- 
ously be branded an atheist. 

I use the word Atheism in quite a different sense. 
It is the absolute denial of any and all forms of God ; 
the denial of the Genus ; the denial of all possible ideas 
of God, — highest as well as lowest. 

At this day there are some philosophers, quite eminent 
men too, who call themselves atheists, and in set terms, 
deny the actuality of any possible idea of God. They 
say the idea of God is a mere whimsey of men, and 
God is not a fact of the universe. Man has a notion 
of God, as of a ghost, or devil ; but it is a pure sub- 
jective fancy, — something which he has spun out of 
his own brain, for there is nothing in the universe to 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



7 



correspond thereto. Man has an Idea of God, but the 
universe has no Fact of God. 

These men do not mean to scoff at others. They 
teach their doctrines with the calmness and precision 
of philosophy, and affirm atheism as their Theory of the 
Universe. It is a conclusion they have deliberately 
arrived at. They are not ashamed of it ; they do not 
conceal it ; do not ostentatiously set it forth. 

I am doing these men no injustice in giving them this 
name, because they claim the style and title of atheists, 
and professedly teach atheism. They are not always 
bigoted atheists, but sometimes philosophical. A few 
of them are in this country, founding schools and sects 
of their way of thinking. Some of them are men of 
quite superior ability, men of very large intellectual cul- 
ture. They seem to be truth-loving and sincere per- 
sons; conscientious, just, humane, philanthropic, and 
modest men aiming to be faithful to their nature, their 
whole nature. They are commonly on the side of man, 
as opposed to the enemies of man; on the side of the 
people, as against a tyrant : they are or mean to be, on 
the side of truth, of justice, and of love. I shall not 
throw stones at these men ; I shah devise no hard 
names against them : they will get abuse enough with- 
out my giving them any at all. I feel great tenderness 
towards them, and very great compassion, — which I 
suppose they would not thank me for. Some of them 
I know personally ; others by their reputation ; some 
by their writings. I think they are much higher in their 
moral and religious growth than a great many men 
who are always saying to God, — "I go, sir," — and 
yet never stir. These are men who have made sacri- 
fices even, to be faithful ; and, without knowing it, they 
have a good deal of practical religiousness of character, 



8 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



both in its subjective form of Piety, and in its objective 
form of personal and social Morality. 

I do not believe that such men are real atheists, 
though they think themselves so ; and I only call them 
so to distinguish their doctrines, and because they them- 
selves assume the name. I think the philosophical 
atheist lacks actuality as much as a devil or a ghost. 

The Bible says, " The fool hath said in his heart, 
There is no God." If the Fool says so, I shall believe 
the fool thinks so ; and if the fool holds up his five 
fingers and says " There is no hand," I shall believe the 
fool thinks so. But when a Philosopher says there is 
no God, I do not believe he thinks so, only that he 
thinks he thinks so. A man may sometimes think he 
sees a thing when he does not see it ; and so a man 
may think he thinks a thing when he does not think it. 
A philosophical and consistent atheist is as much an 
impossibility, I think, as a mathematician who cannot 
count two ; or as a round square, or a three-cornered 
circle. I shall never believe that a sane man who can 
understand the multiplication table is an atheist, though 
he may call himself so. But inasmuch as atheism is 
set up as a theory of the universe, let us look at it, and 
see what real Speculative Atheism is. That is the first 
thing. 

There is a mere formal atheism, which is a denial of 
God in terms. A man says, There is no God ; no God 
that is self-originated, who is the Cause of existence, 
who is the Mind and the Providence of the universe : 
and so the order, beauty, and harmony of the world of 
matter or mind does not indicate any plan or purpose of 
Deity. But, he says, Nature, — meaning by that the 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



9 



whole sum total of existence, — is powerful, wise, and 
good ; Nature is self-originated, the Cause of its own 
existence, the mind of the universe, and the Provi- 
dence thereof. There is obviously a plan and purpose, 
says he, whereby order, beauty, and harmony are 
brought to pass ; but all that is the plan and purpose 
of Nature. 

Very well. In such cases the absolute denial of God 
is only formal, but not real. The Quality of God is 
still admitted, and affirmed to be real ; only the repre- 
sentative of that quality is called Nature, and not 
called God. That is only a change of name. The 
question is this, — "Are there such Qualities in ex- 
istence as we call God ? " It is not, — " How shall we 
name the qualities?" One man may call the sum 
total of these qualities Nature, another Heaven, a third 
Universe, a fourth Matter, a fifth Spirit, a sixth Geist, 
a seventh God, an eighth Theos, a ninth Allah, or what 
he pleases. Spinoza may call God Natura naturans, 
and the rest of the universe Natura naturata; Berosus 
may call God El, and the rest of the Universe Thebal. 
They all admit the existence of the thing so diversely 
entitled. The name is of the smallest consequence. 
All those men that I know, who call themselves athe- 
ists, really admit the actual existence of the qualities I 
speak of. 

Real Atheism is a denial of the existence of any 
God; a denial of the Genus God, of the actuality of all 
possible ideas of God. It denies that there is any 
Mind, or Being, which is the Cause and Providence of 
the universe, and which intentionally produces the order, 
beauty, and harmony thereof with the constant modes 
of operation therein. To be consistent, it ought to go 
a step further, and deny that there is any law, order, 



10 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



or harmony in existence, or any constant modes of 
operation in the world. The real Speculative Athe- 
ist denies the existence of the qualities of God ; denies 
that there is any Mind of the universe, any self-con- 
scious Providence, any Providence at all. If he follows 
out his principle he must deny the actuality of the In- 
finite, deny that there is any Being or Cause of finite 
things which is self-consciously powerful, wise, just, 
loving, and self-faithful. To him there are only finite 
things, — each self-originated, self-sustained, self-di- 
rected, — and no more ; the universe, comprising the 
world of matter, and the world of mind, is a finite 
whole, made up of finite parts ; each part is imperfect, 
the whole incomplete ; the finite has no Infinite to 
depend on as its Ground and Cause ; there is no plan 
in the universe or any part thereof. 

Now see the subjective Effect of this Theory. By 
subjective, I mean the effect it produces on the senti- 
ments and opinions within me. 

I. Look at it first as a Theory of the World of 
Matter. 

In respect to the Origin of matter, both theist and 
atheist labor under the same difficulty: neither knows 
any thing about that. I know men, chiefly theologians, 
pretend to understand all about the creation of matter 
originally ; and to hear them talk you would suppose it 
was as easy to comprehend how " God made a world out 
of nothing," as it is to understand how a tailor makes 
a coat out of broadcloth or velvet. But if a man looks 
with a philosophical eye, he sees this is an extraordi- 
narily difficult thing. The philosophical theist admits 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



11 



the existence of the universe, and the atheist does the 
same ; but in the present state of our knowledge neither 
atheist nor theist knows the mode of origination. You 
may go back a good ways and study the formation of 
an egg, a fish, seed, tree, or rock, or the solar system 
after the fashion of La Place ; but the manner of origi- 
nating matter, out of which the egg, fish, seed, tree, rock, 
and solar system are made, is just as far oil as ever ; 
and it seems to be beyond the reach of the faculties of 
man. I will not say that it is so, only, in the present 
stage of man's development and scientific acquirements, 
it seems so. The origin of Body, — of any specific 
form of matter, — may be made out, but the origin of 
Matter, the primitive, universal substance whence Body 
comes, still eludes our search. I know that ecclesias- 
tical theists often call the philosophical atheist very hard 
names because he denies that we can understand this 
process at present ; the charge is gratuitous. 

But the real speculative atheist must declare that 
Matter, the general substance whereof Body is made, is 
eternal but without thought, or will ; and the specific 
forms of existence, — of egg, fish, seed, tree, rock, and 
solar system, — all came with no forethought preceding 
them ; came " by chance ; " that is to say, by the " for- 
tuitous concourse of atoms " which has no thought or 
will, and that they indicate no mind, no plan, no pur- 
pose, no providence. That is the atheistic theory of the 
universe ; compare it with facts. 

See how this scheme works on a sreat scale in the 

— o 

material world. The solar system has a sun and nu- 
merous planets ; they are all distributed in a certain 
ratio of distance ; they move round the sun with a cer- 
tain velocity, always exactly proportionate to their dis- 



12 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



tance from the sun ; this holds good with regard to the 
nearest and the furthest. They move in paths of the 
same form ; they are ruled by the same laws of motion ; 
they receive and emit light in the same way. The 
laws, which are the constant modes of planetary opera- 
tion, when we come to study them, are found to be ex- 
ceedingly intricate ; yet they are uniform, and the same 
for one planet as for another ; the same for a satellite 
as for a planet. They are perfectly kept, and so uni- 
form in action that if you go back to the time of 
Thales, five hundred years before Christ, you can cal- 
culate the eclipse of the moon, and find that it took 
place exactly as the historians of that day relate ; or 
you may go forward five days, or five years, or five 
thousand years, and calculate with the same precision. 
So accurate are these laws, that an astronomer study- 
ing the perturbations of a remote planet, the phenomena 
of its economy not accounted for by the attraction of 
bodies known to be in existence, conjectures the exist- 
ence of some other planet which causes the phenomena 
not accounted for. Nay, by mathematical science he 
determines its place and size, inferring the fact of a 
new planet outside of the uttermost ring of the solar 
system ; at a certain minute he turns his telescope to 
the calculated spot, and, for the first time, the star of 
Leverrier springs before the eye of conscious man ! 

Now the atheist must declare that all this order of 
the solar system, was brought about by the fortuitous 
concourse of atoms, and indicates no mind, plan, or 
purpose in the universe. This is absurd. A man 
might as well deny the fact of the law of the solar sys- 
tem, or the existence of the sun, or of himself, as to deny 
that these facts, thus coordinated, indicate a mind, de- 
note a plan, and serve a purpose calculated beforehand. 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



13 



See the same thing on a smaller scale. The compo- 
sition of the air is such that first it helps light and 
warm the earth ; is a swaddling garment to keep in the 
specific heat of the earth, and prevent it from radiating 
off into the cold, void spaces of the universe. Next, 
by its free circulation as wind, it helps cleanse and pu- 
rify the earth. Then, it promotes vegetation ; carries 
water from the Tropics to the Norwegian pine, fur- 
nishes much of the food of plants, their means of life. 
Next, it helps animal life, is the vehicle of respiration : 
all plants which grow, all things that breathe, continu- 
ally suck the breasts of heaven. Again, it is a most 
important instrument for the service of man ; through 
this we communicate by artificial light and artificial 
sound. Without it all were motionless and dumb ; 
not a bird could sing or fly, not a cricket creak to his 
partner at night, not a man utter a word ; and a voice- 
less ocean would ebb and flow upon a silent shore. 
The thought-mill would be as idle as the windmill. 
Man kindles his fire by the air ; it moves his ship, 
winnows his corn, fans his temples, carries his bal- 
loon. 

Now the air is capable of these, and a great many 
other functions in virtue of its peculiar composition, — 
so much nitrogen, so much oxygen. No other combi- 
nation of elements could ever have accomplished this. 
Vary the composition, have a little more nitrogen or 
oxygen, and you alter its powers as a vehicle of radia- 
tion, evaporation, vegetation, purification, respiration, 
communication, and combustion. The atheist must 
believe that this composition is not the result of any 
mind, that it serves no plan and purpose, and came by 
the fortuitous concourse of matter ; no more ; that it is 
all chance. 

2 



14 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



If I should say that this sermon came by the fortui- 
tous concourse of matter, that last Monday I shut up 
pen, ink, and paper in a drawer, and to-day went and 
found there a sermon, which had come by the fortuitous 
concourse of pen, ink, and paper, — every man would 
think I was very absurd. And yet I should not com- 
mit so great a quantity of absurdity as if I were to say 
" the composition of air came by the fortuitous con- 
course of atoms ; " for it takes a much greater mind to 
bring together and compose the air which fills a thimble 
than to produce all the sermons, yea, literature, in the 
world. 

If the atheist says there is mind in matter which ar- 
ranges the planets, controls their distances, their revo- 
lutions, their constant modes of operation, that this 
mind in matter arranges the elements in the air so as 
to perform all the functions which I have named, and 
many more, — then he is false to his atheism, and be- 
comes a theist ; for he no longer denies the Qualities of 
God, but only calls them by a different name. 

With atheism as the theory of the universe, the world 
ought to be a jumble of parts with no contexture ; for 
the moment you admit the existence of order in the 
very least form, a constant mode of operation on the 
very smallest scale, — why, you must admit the exist- 
ence of the mind which devised the order and the 
mode of operation; and if you call the mind Geist, 
or, God, or Nature, or Jehovah, it makes small odds : 
the question is not about the name, but about the 
fact. 

Now the world is nowhere a jumble. Things are 
not " huddled and lumped together " in the composition 
of the eyeball of the emmet, or of the solar system. 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



15 



Every part of the universe is an argument against athe- 
ism as a theory thereof. 

II. Look next at atheism as the Theory of Individ- 
ual Human Life. According to the atheistic scheme 
there is no Conscious Power which is the Cause of 
me and of my life, which is the Providence thereof ; no 
Mind which arranges the world in reference to me, or 
me in reference to the world. Does that conclusion 
satisfy the instinctive desires of human nature, any 
better than it accounts for the facts of material na- 
ture ? 

Look at human life from this point of view. I see 
but little ways behind, around, or before me ; and yet, 
in all directions, my power of knowledge is greater 
than my power of work. I know little of the conse- 
quences which will follow from my action. I invent an 
alphabet ; I organize the elements into gunpowder, the 
printing-press, the steam-engine, or men into a repre- 
sentative form of government, with a written constitu- 
tion. I know very little of the effect which these vast 
forces will produce in the world of man. I know that 
the steam-engine will turn my mill, that the printing- 
press will print my newspaper, that gunpowder will ex- 
plode at the touch of fire ; but I do not know the effect 
which these organizations, newly introduced to the 
world, are to have on the families, the communities, the 
churches, the states of mankind, and on the general 
development of the human race. 

The atheist says there is nothing which knows any 
better, or which knows any more about it ; nothing 
which uses these inventions as forces for the advance- 
ment of any purpose. " The universe," says he, " has 
no self-conscious mind except the mind of man, and 



16 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



he is only £ darkly wise and meanly great.' Nothing in 
the world," says our atheist, " knows what a day may 
bring forth. The universe is drifting in the void inane, 
and "knows nothing of its whence, its whither, or its 
whereabouts. Man is drifting in the universe, and 
knows little of his whereabouts, nothing of his whence 
or whither. There is no mind, no providence, no power, 
which knows any better ; nothing which guides and 
directs man in his drifting, or the universe in the wide 
weltering waste of time. Nothing is laid up for to- 
morrow. My life also tends to nothing." 

I am joyful : joy is very well, but nothing comes of it. 
I am sorrowful, and suffer : this is hard, but it is no part 
of a plan which is to lead to something further. And 
when my manhood falls away, and my body dissolves, 
all that is to lead to nothing better. My baby-teeth fall 
out, giving way to my man-teeth, but that is all chance 
indicating no forethought of a mind which provided for 
the man before the baby was born ! 

I serve men, and get their hate and scorn : the Sad- 
ducee grumbles because I tell him of his soul and im- 
mortality; the Pharisee, because I demand that he 
devour widows' houses no more, nor for a pretence 
make long prayers ; and both of these hunkers, the 
hunker Sadducee and the hunker Pharisee, throw stones 
at me, and put me to death. It all comes to nothing 
for me ; I am a dead body, and not a live man : that is 
is all I get for my virtue ! 

I am a brave man, and my country needs me to repei 
the Spanish Armada, or to keep imperial Nicholas, or 
Francis, or papal Pius the Ninth, or the little-hearted 
President Napoleon, from kidnapping my liberty. I go 
out to do battle, and I come home scarred all over with 
heroism, half my limbs hewed off, aching at every pore. 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



17 



Or I die on the spot ; I carry no heroism, no manhood 
with me ; I am a heap of dust which other dust will 
soon cover, but the manhood which once enchanted this 
dust with valiant life, is put out and quenched forever, 
— it is all gone ; it is nothing. My brother in that time 
of peril was a coward ; and when war blew the trumpet 
and his country called on him, he crept under the oven. 
When all is over, and quiet is restored, he comes out 
with a whole skin, and over my unburied bones he 
marches into peace and carousing, and says, " A pretty 
fool was this man to lay down his life for me and get 
nothing for it ! " And the atheist says, " He is right." 

The patriot soldier gets his wounds and crutch, the 
martyr his fagot and flame, Jesus his cup of bitterness 
and cross of death, — and that is all. Dives has his 
purple and fine linen, faring sumptuously every day, 
more heedless than the dogs are of the beggar at his 
gate. Lazarus has his sores and the medical attendance 
of the hounds in the street, but death ends all. 

The mother, whose self-denial leads her to forget ev- 
ery thing but her feeble, crippled child, has nothing but 
her transient affection and watching ; she dies and all is 
ended. Another mother abandons her sickly, pestilen- 
tial child to die of her neglect, and she lives forty years 
longer in joyous wantonness and riot; and when she 
also passes away it is to the same end as the other ; 
only she for her falseness has had forty years of animal 
joy, and the noble mother for her faithfulness has had 
nothing but an instantaneous death. And my atheist 
says, " There is no future world to compensate the 
mother who died for love." 

My fife is a great disappointment, let me suppose ; — 
and for no fault of mine, but for my excellence, my 
justice, my philanthropy, for the service I have rendered 

2* 



18 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



to mankind. I am poor, and hated, and persecuted. I 
flee to my atheist for consolation, and I ask, " What 
does all this come to ? " And he says, " It comes to 
nothing. Your nobleness will do you no good. You 
will die, and your self-denial will do mankind no ser- 
vice ; for there is no plan, or order in all these things ; 
every thing comes and goes by the fortuitous concourse 
of atoms. If you had been a hunker you might have 
had money, ease, honor, respectability, and a long life, 
with the approbation of your minister. You had better 
have been so." 

I lay in the ground one dearest to me ; some only 
daughter — her life but a bud, not a blossom, yet mere 
bud as it is, the better part of my life. In the agony of 
my heart I flee to my atheist for comfort ; and he can- 
not give me a drop of water from the tip of his finger, 
while I am tormented in that unutterable grief. " A 
worm," says he, "has eaten up your rose-bud. Get 
what comfort you can. This is the last spring day, no 
leaf will be green again for you." 

I come myself to die. I have labored to extend my 
existence, which every man loves to do ; and so I 
reached back and sought to find out who my fathers 
and grandfathers were, and trace out my pedigree. I 
wished to extend myself collaterally, and reached forth 
toward Nature, and linked myself with that by science 
and art, and with man by love. The same desire to 
extend myself urges me to go forward, instinct with 
immortality, and join myself again to my dear ones, 
and to mankind, for eternal life. But my atheist stands 
between me and futurity. " Death is the end," says he. 
" This is a world without a God ; you are a body with- 
out a soul ; there is a here but no Hereafter ; an earth 
without a Heaven. Die, and return to your dust ! " 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



19 



" I am a philosopher, 5 ' says he, " I have been up to 
the sky, and there is no Heaven. Look through my 
telescope : that which you see afar off there is a little 
star in the nebula of Orion's belt ; so distant that it 
will take light a thousand million years to come from it 
to the earth, journeying at the rate of twelve million 
miles a minute. There is no Heaven this side of that ; 
you see all the way through ; there is not a speck of 
Heaven. And do you think there is any beyond it ? 

" Talk about your soul ! I have been into man with 
my scalpel in my hand, and my microscope, and there 
is no soul. Man is bones, blood, bowels, and brain. 
Mind is matter. Do you doubt this? Here is Ar- 
noldis' perfect map of the brain : there is no soul there ; 
nothing but nerves. 

" Talk of Providence ! There is no such thing. I 
have been through the universe, and there is no God. 
God is a whim of men; Nature is a fortuitous con- 
course of atoms ; man is a fortuitous concourse of 
atoms ; thought is a fortuitous function of matter, a 
fortuitous result of a fortuitous result, a chance-shot 
from the great wind-gun of the universe, — which itself 
is also a chance-shot, from a chance-charge of a chance- 
gun, accidentally loaded, pointed at random, and fired 
off by chance. Things happen ; they are not arranged. 
There is luck, and ill-luck ; but there is no providence. 
Die into dust ! True, you sigh for immortality ; you 
long for the dear arms of father and mother, that went 
to the ground before you, and for the rose-bud daughter 
prematurely nipped. True, you complain of tears that 
have left a deep and bitter furrow in your cheek ; you 
complain of virtue not rewarded ; of nobleness that felt 
for the Infinite; of a mighty hungering and thirst for 
everlasting life ; a longing and a yearning after God : — 



20 



SPECULATIVE ATHEIS3J. 



All that is nothing. Die, and be still ! " Does not that 
content you ? Does this theory square with the facts 
of consciousness ? 

III. Now look at Atheism as a Theory of the Life 
of Mankind. Man came by chance ; the family by 
chance ; society by chance ; nations by chance ; the 
human race by chance. Man is his own sole guide 
and guardian. No Mind ever grouped the faculties 
together and made a cosmic man, — it was all chance. 
There is no Mind which groups the solitary into fami- 
lies, these into nations, and the nations to a world, — it 
is all chance. There is no Providence for man, except 
in human heads ; Politicians are the only legislators ; 
their statutes the only law — "There is no Higher 
Law." Kings and presidents are the only rulers : there 
is no great Father and Mother of all the nations of 
mankind. There is no Mind that thinks for man, no 
Conscience to enact eternal laws, no Heart to love me 
when father and mother forsake me and let me fall ; no 
Will of the universe to marshal the nations in the way 
of wisdom, justice, and love. History is the fortuitous 
concourse of events, as Nature of atoms; there is no 
plan, nor purpose in it which is to guide our going out 
and coming in. True, there is a mighty going, but it 
goes nowhere. True, there has been a progressive de- 
velopment of man's body and mind, and the functions 
thereof; a growth of beauty, wisdom, justice, affection, 
piety ; but it is an accident, and may end to-morrow, 
and the next day there may be a decay of mankind, a 
decay of beauty, intellect, justice, affection; science, art, 
literature, civilization may be all forgot, and the naked 
savage come and burn up Boston, New York, London, 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



21 



and Paris, and drown the last baby of civilization in the 
blood of the last mother. You are not sure that any 
good wall come of it ; there is no reason to think that 
any good will come of it. Says Atheism, " Everywhere 
is instability and insecurity." 

Look on the aspect of human misery, the outrage, 
blood, and wrong which the earth groans under. Here 
is the wife of a drunkard, whose marriage life is a per- 
petual violation. She married for love a man who once 
loved her; but the Mayor and Aldermen of the city 
insisted that he should be made a beast. A beast, did 
I say ? Ye fourfooted and creeping things of the earth, 
I beg your pardon ! Even the swine is sober in his sty. 
The Mayor and Aldermen of the city made this man a 
drunkard ; and the poor wife watches over him, cleanses 
his garments, wipes off the foulness of his debauch, and 
stitches her life into the garments which some wealthy 
tailor will sell, — giving her for wages the tenth part of 
his own profit, — and which some dandy will wear, — 
thanking the " Gods of dandies " that he is not like that 
poor woman, so ill-clad and industrious. She will 
stitch her life into the garments, working at starvation 
wages, and yet will pay the fines to keep the street 
drunkard out of the House of Correction, where the 
city government hides the bodies of the men it slays. 
She toils till at length the silver cord of life has got 
loosed, and the golden bowl begins to break. She goes 
to my atheist, and asks, " What comes of all this ? 
Am I to have any compensation for my suffering?" 
And the Atheist says, " Nothing comes of it ; there is 
no compensation. You are a fool. You had better 
have got a license from the Mayor and Aldermen to 
prey on other men's wives about you; and then you 



22 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



might have had wealth and ease and respectability. 
You ought to drink blood, and not shed your own." 

" Abel's blood cries out of the ground ; " continues 
our Atheist, " but there is no ear of justice to hear it, and 
Cain, red with slaughter, goes off welcomed to the arms 
of the daughters of Nod ; the victims of nobleness rot 
in their blood ; booty and beauty are both for him. 
The world festers with the wounds of the hero ; but 
there is no cure for them : the hero is a fool, — his 
wounds prove it. Saint Catherine has her wheel, Saint 
Andrew his sword, Saint Sebastian his arrows, Saint 
Lawrence his fire of green wood ; Paul has his fastings, 
his watchings, his scourge, and his jail, his perils of 
waters, of robbers, of the city and the wilderness, his 
perils among false brethren, and Jesus his thorny crown, 
his malefactor's death ; Kossuth gets his hard fate, and 
Francis the Stupid sits on the Hungarian throne ; the 
patriots of France broil in the tropic marshes of Cay- 
enne, and Napoleon, surrounded by cultivated women 
who make him merchandise of their loveliness, and by 
able men who make merchandise of their intellect, 
Napoleon fills his own bosom and the throne of France 
with his debauchery ; Europe is dotted with dungeons, 
— Austrian, Hungarian, German, French, Italian, — 
they are crowded with the noblest men of the age, who 
there do perpetual penance for their self-denial, their 
wisdom, their justice, their affection for mankind, and 
their fidelity to God. These die as the fool dieth. 
There is no hope for any one of them, in a body with- 
out a soul, in an earth without a heaven, in a world 
without a God. Does not that content you ? " 

" All the Christian world over, Oppression plies its 
bloody knout, — its well paid metropolitan Priest bless- 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



23 



ing the scourge before it is laid on. The groan of the 
poor comes up from the bogs of Ireland, and from the 
rich farms of England, and her crowded manufactories. 
Men make circumstances in London, which degrade 
two hundred thousand people below the Cannibals of 
New Zealand, and starve the Irish into exile, brutality, 
or death. The sighing of the prisoner, breaks out from 
the jail of the tormentor, who 

' Holds the body bound, 

But knows not what a range the spirit takes/ 

" The iron gripe of kings chokes the throat of the 
people. Every empire is girded at the loins with an 
iron belt of soldiers, which eats into the nation's flesh. 
Siberia fattens with Freedom's noble dead, and in Amer- 
ica three millions of men drag out a life in chains, 
bought as cattle, sold as cattle, counted as cattle, only 
not prayed for in the Christian churches, as cattle are ; 
and the little commissioner who kidnaps at Boston, and 
the great stealers of men who enact the statutes which 
make American women into marketable things, are hon- 
ored in all the ' Christian ' churches of the land. Most 
of i the great men,' all the ' citizens of eminent gravity,' 
all the 6 unimpeachable divines,' are on the side of 
wrong. Cry out, blood of Abel ! there is no ear to hear 
you. Victims of nobleness, rot in your blood ! it will 
enrich the ground. Ye saints, — Catherine, Andrew, 
Sebastian, Lawrence, Paul, Jesus, — bear your rack 
and gibbet as best your bodies may ! Kossuth, stoop 
to Francis the Stupid! Ye patriots of France, kneel 
to Napoleon the Little, and be jolly in the Sodom 
which he makes. Ye that groan in the dungeons of the 
world, who starve in its fertile soils, who wear chains in 
free America, — yield to the Jeffries, the Haynaus, the 



24 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



slave-hunters, and the priests ! for there is a body with- 
out a soul, an earth without a heaven, a world without 
a God. Atheism is the Theory of the Universe ; and 
there is no God, no Cause, no Mind, no Providence." 
The Atheist looks on the lives of the noble men 

" Who in the public breach devoted stood, 
And for their country's cause were prodigal of blood," 

and he says, " these men were fools ; every man of them 
might have been as sleek, as comfortable, and as fat as 
the oiliest priest that Mammon consecrates. They 
were fools, and only fools, and fools continually. To 
the individual hero there comes nothing but blood and 
wounds." 

He looks on the nations that failed in their struggle 
against a tyrant's chain : Poland fell, and Kosciusko 
went to London, only " Peter Pindar " to welcome the 
exile ; Greece went down in Turkish night ; Italy and 
Spain must bow them to a tyrant's whim, — and the 
Atheist has no hope. The States which fail read no 
lesson to mankind, and have no return for their un- 
blest toil. He looks on the nations now in their agony 
and bloody sweat, sitting in darkness and iron ; he sees 
no Angel strengthening them. What a picture the 
world presents : Heroism unrequited, paid with misery, 
vice on a throne, and nobleness in chains. "Want, mis- 
ery, violence, meet him everywhere ; and for his com- 
fort he has his creed — a body without a soul, an earth 
without a heaven, a world without a God ! 

The Atheist sends out his Intellect to seek for the 
controlling mind, which is the Cause of the created, the 
Reason of the conceivable, the ground of the true, and 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



25 



the loveliness of things beautiful. His intellect comes 
back, and has brought nothing, has found nothing, but 
the reflection of its own littleness mirrored on the sur- 
faces of things. He saw matter everywhere ; he met no 
causal and providing Mind. 

He sends out his Moral Sense to seek the legislat- 
ing Conscience which is Justice in what is right, the 
Ground of good, and the Altogether Beautiful to the 
Moral Sense, the Equitable Will which rules the world. 
But his Moral Sense returns silent, alone, and empty ; 
there is no Equitable Will, no Altogether Beautiful of 
moral excellence, no Ground of Good, no Conscience 
which enacts Justice into an unchanging law of right ; 
there is only the finite will of man, often erring and 
always feeble, man an animated and self-conscious drop 
of dew in the Sahara of the world, conscious of desire, 
of will, but of such feebleness that soon he will exhale 
into thin air, and be no more a drop in all the world, — 
will evaporate into nothing Everywhere is material 
fate, material chance : spiritual order, spiritual provi- 
dence, — that is a dream. 

He sends out his Affections on the same quest, seek- 
ing his heart's desire. They have grown strong by love 
of Nature, — the crystal, the plant, and animal; they 
have been educated by loving man — parent and friend,, 
and wife and child, and all mankind ; refined by loving 
noble men, who attract ingenuous youth as loadstones 1 
draw the iron dust. Now his Affections fly forth with 
trembling wing, and seek the All-perfect Ideal, the ob- 
ject of their love, to stay the hunger of the heart which 
craves the Infinite to feed upon and love. But the 
affections also come back to the sad man with no re- 
turn. " There is nought to love," say they ; " nothing 
save man and the ideals of his heart ; they are beauti- 

3 



26 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



ful, but only bubbles ; his warm breath fills them for a 
moment ; how fair they shine, — they cool, they perish, 
and are not ! The breath was but a part of the windy 
cheat which blows along the world, — the bubble 
breaks, and is nothing. There are only finite things 
for you to love ; only finite things to love you in re- 
turn." He presses the frail object of his affection closer 
and closer to his heart. " This, at least," say I, " is 
secure, and is a fact — the dear one is a reality, and 
not a dream." Still there is a sadness in my eye, 
whence speaks the unrest and wasting of the heart 
which longs for the unchangeable lovely. Death comes 
down to separate me from the best beloved. Beauty 
forsakes the elemental clod, the lip is cold ; the heart is 
still ; the eye — its lovely light all quenched and gone. 
Where is the mind which once spoke to me in hand 
and lip ; the affection which loved me, finding its de- 
light in loving, serving, and in being loved ? It is 
nothing, all gone — like the rainbow of yesterday, no 
trace thereof still lingering on the sky. " But what ! " 
say I, "is there nothing for me to love which will 
not pass away ? " " No : love gravitation, if you like, 
cohesion, the primary qualities of matter ; nought else 
abides." I look up, and an ugly Force is there, alien 
to my mind, foreign to my conscience, and hurtful to 
my heart, and wantonly strikes down the One I valued 
more than self, and sought to defend with my own 
bosom ; then I die, I stiffen into rigid death. So the 
heathen fable tells that Niobe clung to her children with 
warding arms, while the envious deities shot child after 
child, daughters and fan sons, till the twelve were slain, 
and the mother, all powerless to defend her own, herself 
became a stone ! 

Last hope of all, as first not less of all, the atheist 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



27 



sends out his Soul, to seek its rest and bring back tid- 
ings of great joy. Throughout the vast inane it flies, 
feeling the darkness with its wings, seeking the Soul of 
all, which at once is Reason, Conscience, and the Heart 
of all that is, which will give satisfaction to the various 
needs of each. But the soul likewise comes back — 
empty and alone, to say, " There is no God ; the uni- 
verse is a disorder ; man is a confusion ; there is no In- 
finite, no Reason, no Conscience, no Heart, no Soul of 
things. There is nought to reverence, to esteem, to 
worship, to love, to trust in, nothing which in turn loves 
us, with all its universal force. I am but a worm on 
the hot sand of the world, seeking to fly — but it is 
only the instinct of wings I feel ; striving to walk, but 
handless and without a foot ; essaying then to crawl, 
so it be orUy up. But there is not a blade of grass to 
hold on to and climb up by, not a weed to shelter me 
in the intolerable heat of life." 

Thus left alone I look at the ground, and it seems 
cruel, — a mother that devours her young. No voice 
cries thence to comfort me ; it is a force, but nothing 
more. Its history tells of tumult, confusion, and con- 
tinual change ; it prophesies no future peace, tells of no 
plan in the confusion. I look up to the sky, there looks 
not back again a kind Providence, to smile upon me 
with a thousand starry eyes, and bless me with the 
sun's ambrosial light. In the storms a vengeful vio- 
lence, with its lightning sword, stabs into darkness, seek- 
ing for murtherable men. 

There is no Providence, only capricious, senseless 
Fate. Here is the marble of human nature, the athe- 
ist would pile it up into palace or common dwelling ; 
but there is only the fleeting sand to build upon, which 
the rains wash away, or the winds blow off ; nowhere is 



28 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



there eternal Rock to hold his building up. No, he 
has not daily bread, — nothing to satisfy the hunger of 
his mind, his conscience, and his heart, the famine of 
his soul, only the cold, thin atmosphere of fancy. 
Does he believe in immortality, — it is an immortality 
of fear, of doubt, of dread. Experience tells him of the 
history of mankind, a sad history it seems, — a record 
of war and want, of oppression and servility. He sees 
that pride elbows misery into the kennel and is honored 
for the merciless act, that tyrants tread the nations 
underfoot, while some patriot pines to oblivion and 
death ; he sees no prophecy of better things. How can 
he in an earth without a heaven, in a soul without a 
body, a world without a God ? 

Atheism sits down on the shore of Time ; the 
stream of Human History rolls by, bearing successively, 
as bubbles on its bosom, the Egyptian civilization, and 
it passes slowly by with its myriads of millions, and that 
bubble breaks ; the Hebrew, Chaldean, Persian, Gre- 
cian, Roman, Christian civilization, and they pass by 
as other bubbles, with their many myriads of millions 
multiplied by myriads of millions. Their sorrows are 
all ended ; they were sorrows for nothing. The tears 
which furrowed the cheek, the unrequited heroism, the 
virtue unrewarded, — they have perished, and there is 
no compensation ; because it is a body without a soul, 
an earth without a heaven, a world without a God. 
Does not that content you ? " asks our atheist. 
No man can ever be content with that. Few men 
ever come to it, — 

" Thanks to the human heart by which we live ! " 

Human nature stops a great way this side of that. 
I am not a cowardly man ; but if I were convinced 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



29 



there was no God, my courage would drop as water, 
and be no more. I am not an unhopeful man ; there 
are few men who hope so much ; I never despair of 
truth, of justice, of love, and piety ; I know man will 
triumph over matter, the people over tyrants, right over 
wrong, truth over falsehood, love over hate ; I always 
expect defeat to-day, but I am sure of triumph at the 
last; and with truth on my side, justice on my side, 
love on my side, I should not fear to stand in a mi- 
nority of one, against the whole population of this 
whole globe of lands : I would bow and say to them, 
— "I am the stronger ; you may glory now, but I 
shall conquer you at last." Such hope have I for 
man here and hereafter, that the wickedest of sinners, 
I trust, God will bring face to face with the best of 
men, his sins wiped clean off, and together they shall 
sit down at the table of the Lord, in the Kingdom of 
God. But take away my consciousness of God, and I 
have no hope ; none for myself, none for you, none for 
mankind. If no Mind in the universe were greater than 
Humboldt's, no ruler wiser than presidents, and kings, 
and senates, and congresses, if there were no appeal 
from the statutes of men to the Laws of God, from pres- 
ent misery to future eternal triumph, on earth, or in 
Heaven, — then I should have no hope. But I know 
that the universe is insured at the office of the Infinite 
God, and no particle of matter, no particle of mind shall 
ever suffer ultimate shipwreck in this vast voyage of 
mortal and immortal life. 

I am not a sad man. Spite of the experience of life, 
somewhat bitter, I am a cheerful, and a joyous, and a 
happy man. But take away my consciousness of God ; 
let me believe there is no Infinite God; no infinite 
Mind which thought the world into existence, and 



30 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



thinks it into continuance ; no infinite Conscience which 
everlastingly enacts the Eternal Laws of the Universe ; 
no infinite Affection which loves the world ; loves Abel 
and Cain, — loves the drunkard's wife and the drunk- 
ard ; the Mayors and Aldermen who made the drunk- 
ard ; which loves the victim of the tyrant, and loves the 
tyrant ; loves the slave and his master ; loves the mur- 
dered and the murderer, the fugitive, and the kidnapper, 
— publicly griping his price of blood, the third part of 
Iscariot's pay, and then secretly taking his anonymous 
revenge, stealthily calumniating some friend of human- 
ity ; convince me that there is no God who watches 
over the nation, but " forsaken Israel wanders lone ; " 
that the sad people of Europe, Africa, America, have 
no guardian, — then I should be sadder than Egyptian 
night ! My life would be only the shadow of a dimple 
on the bottom of a little brook, — whirling and passing 
away ; all the joy I have in the daily business of the 
world, in literature and science and art, in the friend- 
ships and wide philanthropies of the time, would perish 
at once, — borne down in the rush of waters and lost 
in their headlong noise. Yes, I should die in uncon- 
trollable anguish and despair. 

A realizing sense of atheism, a realizing sense of the 
consequences of atheism, — that would separate our 
nature, and we should give up the ghost ; and the ele- 
ments of the body would go back to the elements of 
the earth. But — God be thanked ! — the foundation 
of religion is too deep within us. There is a great cry 
through all creation for the Living God. Thanks to 
Him, the evidence of God has been ploughed into Na- 
ture so deeply, and so deeply woven into the texture of 
the human soul, that very few men call themselves 
atheists in this sense. No man ever willingly came to 



SPECULATIVE ATHEISM. 



31 



this conclusion : no man ; no, not one ! Those men, 
who have arrived at this conclusion, — we should cast 
no scorn at them ; we should give them our sympathy ; 
a friendly heart, and the most affectionate and tender 
treatment of their soul. 

Religion is natural to man. Instinctively we turn to 
God, reverence Him, and rely on Him. And when 
Reason becomes powerful, when all the spiritual facul- 
ties get enlarged, and we know how to see the true, to 
will the just, to love the beautiful, and to live the holy, 
— then our idea of God rises higher and higher, as the 
child's voice changes from the baby's treble pipe to the 
dignity of manly speech. Then the feeble, provisional 
ideas of God which were formed at first, pass by us ; 
the true idea of God gets written in our soul, complete 
Beauty drives out partial ugliness, and perfect Love 
casts out all partial fear. 



SERMON II. 

ATHEISM AS ETHICS. 



LUKE XVII. 5. 

INCREASE OUR F A I 



II. 



OF PEACTICAL ATHEISM, REGARDED AS A 
PRINCIPLE OF ETHICS. 



Last Sunday I said something of Speculative Athe- 
ism, that is, of atheism considered as a theory of the 
universe ; with some of the effects on the feelings, and 
the views of Nature, and individual and general human 
life, which come thereof. To-day I ask your attention 
to a sermon of Practical Atheism ; that is to say, of 
Atheism, considered as the Principle of practical Ethics. 

If a man starts with the idea that there is a body and 
no soul, an earth without a heaven, and a world with- 
out a God, that idea needs must become a principle of 
practice, and as such it will have a quite powerful effect 
on the man's active character ; it will come at length to 
be the controlling principle of his life. For as in human 
nature the religious is the foundation-element of man, 
as I showed the other day, so any misarrangement in 
that quarter presently appears at the end of the hands, 
and affects the whole life of man. 

Speculative Atheism will not be fully reduced to 
practice all at once, but in the long run it will assur- 
edly produce certain peculiar results ; just as certainly 

(35) 



36 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



as any seed you plant in the ground will bear fruit after 
its own kind, and not after another kind. You and I 
are not very consistent, it may be, and we therefore 
allow something to come between our first principle 
and the conclusion which would follow from it ; but 
the Human Race is exceeding logical, and carries out 
every principle into practice, making its earnest thoughts 
into very serious things : only the idea is not carried 
out at once, but in long ages of time, and by successive 
generations of men. Every theological idea, positive 
or negative, that is firmly believed in by mankind or by 
nations, will ultimately be carried out by them to its 
legitimate, practical effect, and will appear in their trade, 
politics, laws, manners, — in all the active life of man- 
kind. We think that the litany which we repeat in the 
church is our confession of faith. Often, that reaches 
very little ways in ; but the real confession of the world's 
faith is writ in its trade and politics, in its wars and 
hospitals, in its armies and school-houses, better than 
in its "pious literature." The history of America, is 
the publication of our real theology, the confession of 
our actual creed. Each intentional act comes from a 
sentiment or idea. It is well to see what our ideas are 
before the thought becomes a thing. 

Last Sunday I showed that there was a mere formal 
speculative atheism, which was only a denial of God 
in terms, or the denial of the actuality of a certain 
special idea of God, but yet contained an affirmation 
of the quality of God under another name ; while real 
speculative atheism was the denial of the quality of 
God under all names, a denial of the actuality of any 
possible idea of God. And I showed also that there 
were reputed atheists, who denied some specific notion 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



37 



of God, because they had a better one ; and because 
they were really more theistic and more religious than 
the men about them. 

The same distinction is to be made in respect to 
practical atheism. Real practical atheism is the living 
of speculative atheism as a practice ; that is, the living 
as if there was no God, who is the Mind, Cause, and 
Providence of the world ; and that is living as if a man 
had no natural obligation to think and speak true, to do 
right, to feel kind, and to be holy or faithful to himself; 
living as if there were no soul, no heaven, no God. 
That is real, practical atheism. 

There is a formal practical atheism, which is merely 
formal, and is based on formal speculative atheism. As 
the mere formal speculative atheist denies the name of 
God, but affirms the quality of God, and ascribes that 
quality to Nature, — so the mere formal practical atheist 
denies that man owes any natural absolute obligation 
to God, to think true, to do right, to feel kind, and to be 
holy ; but he affirms that he owes this natural and abso- 
lute obligation to Nature ; either to all Nature, repre- 
sented by the universe, or to partial Nature, represented 
by mankind, or by the individual man, or some special 
faculty in man. In this case the atheist really affirms 
the absolute obligation of man to the quality of God, 
only he gives that quality of God another name, and is 
no practical atheist at all ; though he thinks he is so,, 
and calls himself by that hard name. For only the 
semblance of real practical atheism can be built on the 
semblance of real speculative atheism. If a man con- 
fesses that he has a natural and absolute obligation to 
think true, to do right, to feel kind, and to be holy, it is 
comparatively of little consequence whether he says 

4 



38 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



that he owes this obligation to Nature or to God; 
because in such a case he means the same by the 
word " Nature " that another man means by the word 
" God ; " and the obligation is the same, the conscious- 
ness of it is the same, and the duty which comes there- 
from will be just the same. 

I dislike to hear Nature called God, or God called 
Nature. Let each thing have its own name. In due 
time I will show what evils are like to follow from this 
confusion of terms, miscalling the finite and the Infinite. 
Still that confusion is not atheism. 

Real practical atheism, I say, is the carrying out of 
real speculative atheism into life, living as if there were 
no natural obligation on man to think true, to do right, 
to feel kind, and to be holy; no obligation, therefore, to 
be faithful to himself as a whole, or to any part of him- 
self as a part. 

This real practical atheism is divisible for the present 
purpose into two forms. 

First, the Undisguised practical Atheism. Here the 
practical atheist openly and undisguisedly denies the 
quality of God, denies that he owes any natural obliga- 
tion to think true, to do right, to feel kind, or to be self- 
faithful ; and on the contrary affirms speculative atheism 
as his practical principle and motive of life, and then 
endeavors to live up to it, — or live down to it. That 
is one form. 

Second, the other is Disguised practical Atheism. 
Here the practical atheist acts on the idea that he has 
no natural obligation to think true, to do right, to feel 
kind, and to be holy ; and thus really and in act denies 
the idea of God ; but suppresses the formal denial of 
God and the affirmation of atheism ; or he even goes 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 39 

so far as to affirm his belief in God, and deny his as- 
sumption of atheism as a principle of action. That is 
the other form. 

Now in truth these two men, the undisguised pro- 
fessor of atheism, and the disguised practiser thereof, if 
they were consistent, would act pretty much alike in 
most cases, and do the same thing ; only the undis- 
guised atheist would do it overtly, with no denial of the 
fact and motive, but with the affirmation of each ; and 
the disguised atheist would do it covertly, denying both 
the fact and the motive, thus adding hypocrisy to athe- 
ism. The undisguised atheist will be the more manly, 
because he is more thorough-going in his manhood ; 
and such a person will always command a certain 
degree of admiration, because it is manly in the man 
to say right out what he thinks right in ; and if he is 
going to live after a certain principle, to declare that 
principle beforehand. There is a consistency of man- 
hood in that, and the very assertion is therefore often a 
guarantee of the man's honesty. But the disguised 
atheist will be the more atheistic, because he is really 
the more thorough-going in his atheism. One is true 
to his natural character as man, the other to his con- 
ventional character as atheist, for as atheism is the 
negation of Nature, so the negation of itself is a legit- 
imate function of atheism. The reason of this will 
appear presently. 

I said last Sunday that there never was any com- 
plete, real speculative atheism in the world ; for com- 
plete, real speculative atheism is so abhorrent to human 
nature, that if a man had a realizing sense thereof and 
of its speculative consequences, he must needs die out- 
right. I may say the same of complete, real practical 
atheism. There is no complete and real practical athe- 



40 PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 

ism ; for I think nobody could ever be perfectly consist- 
ent with real speculative atheism, and live as if he felt 
absolutely no obligation to speak true, to do right, to 
feel kind, and to be holy. That, therefore, is an ex- 
treme which man cannot possibly reach. Human 
nature would give up before it came to such a conclu- 
sion. It is conceivable — but neither actual nor pos- 
sible. 

But yet there is a great deal of practical conduct 
which logically rests on this basis, and on no other, and 
though no man was ever fully false to his nature, and 
fully true to his atheism, yet very many are partially 
false to their nature, and partially true to atheism ; and 
so there is a good deal of practical atheism in the world ; 
much more than there appears of real speculative athe- 
ism ; and though no man is a complete practical atheist, 
yet there are many with whom practical atheism pre- 
ponderates in their daily life, and turns the balance. I 
mean to say they live more atheistically than theistical- 
ly. The man does not clearly say to himself, " There 
is no God ; " he only half-says it, and little more than 
half-acts on that supposition. He does not say out, 
" There is no God, and hence no obligation to speak 
true, act right, feel kind, and be faithful to myself; " be- 
cause, first, there is some theism left in the man, — I 
think nobody can ever empty himself wholly of the 
consciousness of God ; — or next, because the man is 
not fully self-conscious of his consciousness, so to say, 
and does not really and distinctly bring to light the 
principles which are yet the governing principles in his 
nature ; — Or, finally, if he is thus conscious, he does 
not dare to say it, but yet acts mainly on that supposi- 
tion. Now there is a great deal of this in the world ; 
very much more than appears at first sight. 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



41 



I mentioned the other day that some men whom I 
knew, calling themselves atheists, were yet excellent 
men; true, just, loving, and holy men; full of a certain 
religiousness, eminently faithful to themselves, keeping 
the integrity of their conscience at great cost of self- 
denial, and feeling more strongly than the majority of 
men the absolute obligation they were under to be faith- 
ful to every limb of their body and every faculty of their 
spirit. These were only formal atheists, not real athe- 
ists. They did not think there was no God ; they only 
thought that they thought so. Some of these men 
have really a higher idea of the quality of God than the 
Christians about them ; only they do not call it God, 
but Nature ; for the " Nature " of the physical philoso- 
pher, or the " Mind " of the metaphysical philosopher is 
sometimes higher in some particulars, than the notion 
of the " Trinity," or the notion of the " Unity," which 
the general run of Christians have formed. I am bound 
as a faithful man to confess this. So some of these 
who are called atheists, and who name themselves so, 
are in reality more theistic and more religious than the 
general run of Christians about them. Such men as 
these do not show the practical characteristics of real 
atheism, but of the real theism which they have dis- 
guised to themselves by the name of atheism. 

Thus one of these in America says, " It will do very 
well for Christian Doctors of Divinity and deacons, who 
believe in an angry God that will damn mankind for- 
ever, to declare there is in the universe no Law higher 
than the Baltimore Platform, and the Compromise Meas- 
ures of the American Congress. It will do very well for 
them to declare that an angry God has given politicians 
authority to make such statutes, and declare them bind- 
ing on men, and so ' suppress ' and 4 discountenance all 

4* 



42 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



agitation ' for the welfare of one sixth part of the popu- 
lation of the country. But atheists, who believe in Na- 
ture, — the material world, — in Mind, — the spiritual 
world, — they must declare that there is a Higher Law; 
to wit: the Law of Nature, seen everywhere in the 
ground, and in the sun ; and the Law of Mind also, 
felt everywhere in the consciousness of Man." 

It is very plain that this man, though he calls him- 
self an atheist, has really an idea of God, and conse- 
quently of man's obligation to speak true, act right, feel 
kind, and be holy, much higher than the Christian di- 
vine who would send his mother into bondage to keep 
the Compromise Measures; a much higher idea than 
the man who would renounce his reason for the sake 
of his creed, and who would give up his humanity in 
order to join a church, or to keep the wicked statutes 
which men make in their parliaments. Here you per- 
ceive the man calling himself by that ugly name, was 
only a formal atheist, and had really an idea of God 
which vastly transcended that of the churches about 
him. I am bound in justice to say this. 

The actual consequence of atheism as a principle of 
action is something very different from that. The prac- 
tical atheist, starting from his speculative principle that 
there is nothing which is the Mind, the Cause, and the 
Providence of the universe, or of any part thereof; and 
accordingly that Nature and Man are, respectively, the 
only mind, cause, and providence of themselves, — he 
must necessarily believe that man is under no natural 
and absolute obligation to think true, to do right, to feel 
kind, and to be holy. He must deny that there is any 
such obligation to God, because he denies the existence 
of God, or because he denies the existence of the quality 
of God, and he must deny that he owes this obligation 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



43 



to himself ; for as man is his own mind, cause, provi- 
dence, lawgiver, and director, so every propensity of the 
man is likewise and equally its own cause, its own 
mind, its own providence, its own lawgiver and director. 
Accordingly passion is no more amenable to reason and 
conscience, than reason and conscience are amenable to 
passion. The parts are no more amenable to the whole, 
than the whole to any one of the parts. Man is finite, 
and there is no Higher Being above man ; and so there 
is no Higher Law above the caprice of any passion or 
any calculation. The man may will any thing that he 
will, and it shall be his law. For reason there stands 
the arbitrary caprice of man, the arbitrary caprice of 
each instinctive desire, or of any calculated act of will, 
and no more. 

If the atheist admits there is in human consciousness 
an Idea of Right, he must declare it is not any more 
binding upon man than the Idea of Wrong. We form 
an Idea of Absolute Right : "it is a mere whim," says 
the atheist ; " there exists no substance in which the 
Absolute Right can inhere. It is an abstract quality 
which belongs to no substance. It is a nothing ; only 
it differs from an absolute transcendental nothing in 
this, that it is a thinkable nothing ; not real, — an actual 
thing; not possible, — a thing to become actual; yet 
conceivable — an actual thought in the mind. You 
may distribute nothing into various heads, and say there 
is a pure nothing, which cannot be conceived of at all. 
You can have no notion of a pure nothing — it is not 
even thinkable ; that is absolute transcendental nega- 
tion — a denial of subjective conceivableness, as well 
as of objective actuality. Then you may say, there is 
also another form of nothing, which is the thinkable 
nothing. According to an atheist, God is a thinkable 



44 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



nothing, and the Idea which men have of God, has no 
more objective actualness to support it, than the Idea 
of Light would have if all material light, all actual, and 
all possible light, were blotted out of being. Then all 
the necessary attributes of God fall into the same class 
— thinkable nothings. So do all the transcendent attri- 
butes of man. Truth is a thinkable nothing, Justice a 
thinkable nothing, and any excellence which surpasses 
the excellence of Thomas, and Richard, and Henry, or 
all actual men, is also nothing ; only it is a thinkable 
nothing, not a transcendental nothing. 

This being the case, there is nothing for me to aspire 
after. Ideal wisdom, justice, love, holiness, each is but 
a thinkable nothing; — I should not aspire after that, 
more than I should marshal ghosts into an army to go 
out and fight a battle ; or put in battery a non-existent 
but yet thinkable cannon, which is no cannon, and good 
for nothing. And then, all reverence must, of course, be 
weeded out from the mind of the practical atheist. He 
can only reverence something that he sees with his eye 
or feels with his hand, or reverence himself. This 
faculty of reverence which is born in us, — so delightful 
as a sentiment, as a principle so strong, — must take 
one of two forms : that of servility, crouching down 
before a man ; or of self-esteem, strutting proudly in 
its own conceit. There is no other form possible for it. 

The practical atheist denies God, and of course 
denies religion in all its parts ; absolutely denies all 
obligation ; to him the idea of obligation and of duty 
must lack actuality. He must deny my obligation to 
conform to my reason, conscience, affections. There is 
no reason therefore why I should speak and think true, 
do right, feel kind, and be holy, if it is agreeable to me 
to do otherwise. Therefore if I am an atheist, and if 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



45 



atheism be unpopular, my atheism will justify me in 
denying atheism itself and in affirming theism. So 
atheism, in this way, is self-destructive ; its development 
is its dissolution. So to deny atheism, under such cir- 
cumstances, will be more atheistic than to affirm it. 
The atheist who denies it is false to his manhood ; 
there is no atheistic reason why he should be true to it ; 
and the more he denies it, the more he is faithful to his 
atheistic opinion. So the expedient must take the 
place of the true and the right ; the agreeable must take 
the place of the beautiful ; desire, the place of duty ; 
and I will must take the place of that solemn word, I 
ought. There can be no ought in the grammar of 
atheism. 

But as the atheist in denying God denies the soul, 
and in doing that denies the immortality of man, his 
range of expediency must be limited to this life ; and 
not only must it be limited to the earthly life of the 
human race, — which may be eternal for aught we 
know, — but it must be limited to the life of the partic- 
ular atheist who thinks it, and even to the humbler fac- 
ulties and lower wants of his nature ; and so the high- 
est thing he can desire must be his own present com- 
fort. That is the highest real thing that he knows. 
So speculative atheism reduced to practice, must logi- 
cally lead to complete material selfishness, and can lead 
to nothing else. 

But as human nature will not allow complete specu- 
lative atheism as a theory of the universe, so it will not 
any more allow complete practical atheism, or complete 
selfishness, as a principle of life. There is a margin of 
oscillation around every man, and we are allowed to 
vibrate a little from side to side. This margin seems 
sometimes pretty wide, but complete practical atheism 



46 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



or complete speculative atheism lies a great ways be- 
yond the limit of human oscillation. It is a think- 
able nothing, — conceivable but not actual, or even pos- 
sible. Still practical atheism actually tends to that con- 
clusion. 



All this which I have said is general in its applica- 
tion; is universal — it will apply to all forms of life. 
Now see how this atheism will manifest itself in the 
practical conduct of men in the various forms of Indi- 
vidual, Domestic, Social, National, and General Human 
Life. Let me say a word of each of these in its order. 

I. I will speak first of the Individual Life. 

As by the atheistic theory of the universe there is no 
such thing as moral obligation, no such thing as Duty, 
no Absolute Right, — as Man is the highest Mind in 
the universe, his own Cause, his own Providence, his 
own Originator, his own Sustainer, and his own Direc- 
tor, — so he is perfectly free to do exactly as he pleases. 
Duty will resolve itself into caprice of selfishness. 
Each man is to concentrate himself particularly upon 
the desire that is uppermost at the time ; for as I am 
my own end, and to seek my own welfare at all hazards, 
so each particular propensity in me is its own end, and 
to seek its own welfare, — that is, its own gratification, 
— at any or all hazards. 

So in my Period of Passion, the gratification of the 
passional propensities will be the chief thing which I 
am to seek. I recognize no Higher Law, in me or out 
of me ; no law to prescribe a rule of conduct for me as 
a whole, or to prescribe a rule of conduct for any par- 
ticular part of me, — any special passion. To acknowl- 
edge an imperative and extra-human law from without, 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



47 



which has a natural right to claim allegiance from me 
and to rule me as a whole — that would be to confess a 
God; not in terms, but in fact. To acknowledge an 
imperative and extra-passional law within me, to which 
I owe allegiance and which has a natural right to rule 
over any one passion, is to acknowledge God in degree ; 
for what has a natural right to rule absolutely over any 
one particular propensity is God, so far as that propensity 
is concerned ; and as I deny the actuality of the Infinite, 
and do not acknowledge a God who is the Reason and 
Conscience of the Universe and has the right to rule 
over me as a whole, no more do I acknowledge that 
my own personal reason and conscience have the right 
to rule over me or over any special appetite or desire. 
There is no extra-personal and Infinite Norm to pre- 
scribe a rule of conduct for me ; there is no intra-personal 
and finite norm to prescribe a rule of conduct for any ap- 
petite or passion, So I am to let my passion have its 
swing in its quest for pleasure. If I have got rid of the 
great God of the universe, and acknowledge no abso- 
lute obligation to think true, to do right, to feel kind, 
and to be holy, — it will be ridiculous in me to set up a 
little God in my own consciousness, and acknowledge 
the obligation of my members to conform thereto in 
any one particular. 

So the negation of religion as a whole carries with 
it the negation of control over any one particular pas- 
sion. As the universe is a " fortuitous concourse of 
atoms," without any thing to rule it, with no mind to 
direct it, self-originated, self-directed, self-sustained, so 
my consciousness must be a fortuitous concourse of 
passions with no harmony therein ; every passion self- 
originated, self-directed, self-sustained, its own end, and 



48 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



to seek its own gratification wholly regardless of its 
neighbor, or the whole body. 

Accordingly in the Period of Passion I may give 
loose to my instinctive appetites. You come to me 
and say, " There is a God. You must not break his 
law." I deny this. " At least there is something that 
is right, and you must do that." I" deny that also ; I 
say there is no such thing as right. " At any rate you 
must control your passions for the good of your whole 
nature, during a long life." But, why should I do that ? 
What right have I to control this or that passion, and 
debar it of its temporary lust, for the sake of giving 
the whole man a lasting delight ? The passion has no 
norm but itself ; what right has the whole man to con- 
trol any part of him, or one part to hold another in 
check ? or put off pleasure to-day for more pleasure to- 
morrow ? So at this period of life anarchy of passions 
is the only atheistic self-government. 

In the Period of Ambition — which in New England 
is commonly by far the more dangerous of the two, as 
its perils lead to fortune, and the ruin it brings is 
deemed "eminent success" — I am to let the other 
selfish propensities seek each its own object, and not 
hinder them. I am covetous : I am not to restrain my 
avarice by my reason, my conscience, my affections; 
I am to seek my own gain in all ways, at all hazards, 
and in derision of reason, of conscience, and of affection. 
There is no principle to stand between me and the dol- 
lar, or the office which I covet. I am to be wholly un- 
scrupulous in my zeal, and in the means I make use of. 
to achieve my end. I have a great love of power, fame, 
ease ; and I am to let each of these desires have its full 
swing. There is no higher power to prescribe a rule of 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



49 



conduct for my ambition, more than for my passion. 
Here all must be a fortuitous concourse of ambitions, 
the anarchy of ambitions is the only atheistic self-gov- 
ernment at this period. 

So there is nothing to prevent my life from being the 
mere selfishness of passion in youth, seeking pleasure 
as its object; or the selfishness of ambition in manhood, 
seeking profit as its goal ; for nothing has any right to 
stand between me and the object of my ambition, more 
than between me and the object of my passion. Athe- 
ism must be universal anarchy ! 

Now each of these forms of atheism may assume two 
modes, One is that of Gross Selfishness, that is, gross 
sensualism of pleasure in the period of passion, or gross 
calculation of profit in the period of ambition. It will 
terminate in the gross voluptuary or the gross hunker. 
That is one form. It is the rude, coarse, vulgar form. 
It is the shape in which atheism would manifest itself 
with the pfoor, with the uneducated, with the roughest 
of men. It is the atheism of savagery, — -the practical 
atheism of St. Giles' parish in London. 

The other mode is that of Refined Selfishness, that is, 
refined sensualism of pleasure in the period of passion, 
or the refined calculation of profit, in the period of am- 
bition ; and so here it will terminate in the delicate and' 
subtle voluptuary, or else in the delicate and subtle 
hunker ; — This is the atheism of civilization, the athe- 
ism of St. James' parish in London. The mode will 
depend on the temperament and circumstances of the 
man. And yet you see these two are generically the 
same; with unity of idea and unity of purpose, both 
seek a selfish object, and both come to the same end, 
only one in the delicate and the other in the gross form* 

5 



50 



PEACTICAL ATHEISM. 



In either case the aim of life is to be the rehabilitation 
of selfishness ; I mean the enthroning of selfishness as 
the leading practical principle of life. The atheist is to 
look on every faculty as an instrument of pleasure or 
profit ; to look on his life as a means of 'selfishness and 
no more ; to look on himself as a beast of pleasure or a 
beast of prey. Behold the man of atheism ! — his con- 
trolling principle selfishness ; his life " poor, and nasty, 
and short ! " 

Now man is not selfish by nature. We have self-love 
enough to hold us together. Self-love, the conservative 
principle of man, is the natural girdle put about our 
consciousness to keep us from falling loose, and spread- 
ing, and breaking asunder. In human nature self-love 
is not too strong. When all the faculties act in har- 
mony there is no excess of this. But if you deny that 
faculty which looks to the Infinite, which hungers for 
the ideal true, the ideal just and lovely and holy, then 
self-love, conservative of the individual, degenerates 
into selfishness, invades others, and each man becomes 
merely selfish. 

This fact implies no defect in the original constitu- 
tion of Man ; for it is a part of the plan of human na- 
ture that religion, the consciousness of God, should be 
the foundation-element of spiritual consciousness, and 
so the condition of manifestation for all the high facul- 
ties put together : and as roses will not bloom without 
light and warmth, or as ships cannot keep the sea with- 
out keel and rudder and a hand upon the helm, no more 
can the high qualities of humanity come forth without 
we put in its proper place the foundation-element of 
man, and let the religious faculty lay its hand upon the 
helm. The individual atheist, if consistent, must prac- 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



51 



tically live in utter selfishness — material selfishness, sel- 
fishness bounded by the short span of his own earthly 
existence. And that is individual ruin. 

II. See next the effect of practical atheism on Do- 
mestic Life, in the Family. The normal basis and 
bond of union in the family is Mutuality of Love in its 
various forms: connubial — between man and wife, — 
parental, affiliative or kindly between kith and kin, — 
and friendly love. 

Connubial love in its normal state consists of two 
factors, — passion, seeking the welfare of the lover, and 
affection, which seeks the welfare of the beloved. In 
normal connubial love these two, the plastic and the 
pliant are coordinated together. Each aims to delight 
the other more than to enjoy himself, and finds his satis- 
faction less in enjoying than in delighting. Passion is 
then beautiful and affection is delightful. Self-love is 
subordinate to the love of another, the special to the 
universal. The love of the true, the just, the ever beau- 
tiful, and the holy, comes in, and prevents even the 
existence of selfishness. This condition affords an op- 
portunity for developing and enjoying some of the 
highest qualities of man. Passion is instinctive, and 
affection also is instinctive at first ; but as man de- 
velops himself by culture, as the human race enlarges 
in its progressive unfolding, so the affections become 
larger and larger, more powerful in the individual and 
the race, and the joy of delighting becomes greater and 
more. 

But in practical atheism the family must rest on 
Mutuality of Selfishness, not on mutuality of love. 
And this must appear in all its forms, in the relation 
between acquaintances or friends, between kith and kin, 



52 



PEACTICAL ATHEISM. 



between parent and child, between man and mfe. 
Marriage must be only for the selfishness of transient 
pleasure, or the selfishness of permanent profit. The 
parental and filial relation must be only a relation of 
selfishness, the parents wanting the chili to serve them 
as a beast of burden or as a toy, and the children want- 
ing the parent to serve them, and valuing father or 
mother only for what they get therefrom. The rela- 
tions of kinship, of brother and sister, of uncle and 
nephew, of aunt and niece ; the relation of friendship 
must also be of selfishness, and no more. Passion 
must be all lust, and affection die out and give place to 
selfish calculation. The wife must be the husband's 
tool or his toy, and the husband the toy or the tool of 
the wife. 

Marriage is then possible for the sake only of three 
things ; first, for animal gratification ; next for pecu- 
niary profit ; last for social respectability. It is a union 
of passions in the one case, of estates in the next, of 
respectabilities in the last ; at any rate it is the conjunc- 
tion of bodies without a soul, of selfishness without 
self-denial, for a here with no hereafter, and in a world 
with no God. Behold the family of practical atheists ! 
Atheism gone to housekeeping! the housekeeping of 
atheism like the individual life thereof, — must be what 
Hobbes said of it, — " poor, and nasty, and short ! " Ex- 
pect no self-command here for conscience' or affection's 
sake ; no self-denial to-day, for dear and lasting delight 
to-morrow; no self-sacrifice for another's joy or another's 
growth : mutuality of selfishness is all ; and the stronger 
selfishness must carry the day ; and that is the ruin of 
the family. No family life of joy is possible without 
self-denial on all sides. The wife must deny herself 
for the husband ; the husband, himself for the wife ; the 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



53 



parent for the child ; kith for kin, and friend for friend. 
The stronger and nearer I fold another to my bosom, 
the nearer and stronger is the demand on me for self- 
denial, yea for self-sacrifice for the sake of the object that 
my arms enfold. 

Now there is much partial practical atheism which 
appears in this domestic form. The present position 
of woman is only justified on the ground that there is no 
God : men do not understand it as yet ; one day they 
surely will. Every marriage which is not based on mu- 
tuality of affection, — where good is to be taken and 
good is to be given, and man and wife both are to take 
and both are to give, — is bottomed at last on practical 
atheism; only on that. The other day I said it was 
impossible for a man to be a complete speculative athe- 
ist. It is impossible for him to be a complete practical 
atheist. But grant that there was a complete practical 
atheistic man, and a complete practical atheistic woman ; 
— would marriage be possible between the two? By 
no means ! Not at all ! Juxtaposition of bodies is all 
that would take place. Selfishness is never a bond of 
real wedlock. 

Philosophers in the last century, in France, thought 
that the Spider had not yet developed all its economy, 
but might be used for nice purposes of fabric and 
manufacture amongst men. They thought they could 
get the filament of a web finer than that of the silk- 
worm's weaving, out from the spider's mouth. The 
spider is not gregarious. The philosophers gathered 
together an innumerable host of the insects and shut 
them up in one room, and left them to their weaving, 
feeding them with flies and other food which the spi- 
der's appetite longed for. After a few days there was 
only a single spider left. They fought with each other, 

5* 



54 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



and slew one another, till the king-spider was the only 
one left, and selfishness had eat itself up. 

III. See how practical atheism will appear in a 
larger form of action, — the Social Form, in the Neigh- 
borhood and Community. 

The normal basis of society is first the gregarious in- 
stinct, which we have in common with sheep and kine. 

Next, comes the social will, which is peculiar to man, 
and has this superiority over the gregarious instinct, — 
it is to join men together in such a way that the indi- 
viduality of each shall be preserved, while the sociality 
of all is made sure of. That cannot take place with 
the animals; and for this reason, — because they are 
not persons, and free spiritual individuality does not 
seem of so much value among sheep and kine as 
amongst men. Each particular Ox may be only " so 
much of the ox-kind ; " this Bison only so much of the 
bison-kind, and that Buffalo so much of the buffalo-kind; 
and the individuality of either is of no great value for the 
development of the ox or the ox-kind. But when you 
come to man, Thomas is one man, and Oliver is another, 
and Jason is a thud ; and it is just as necessary to pre- 
serve the tree spiritual individuality of each one of these 
as the individuality of the whole human race. There- 
fore this social will must so control the gregarious in- 
stinct that the individual shall be kept whole while so- 
ciality is made sure of. 

Then there is a third thing ; namely, the religious as- 
piration, which desires the absolutely true, just, and 
lovely ; and this desire can only be brought out in full 
action in the company or society of men. 

Accordingly in a normal society there will be, first, 
individual self-love, seeking to develop and enjoy itself : 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



55 



then the social affection, seeking to delight and develop 
others about us ; and these two may be so coordinated 
that the individual is kept in society, and the mass also 
is developed and blessed by the concurrent desire to 
enjoy and to delight: then there will also be the relig- 
ious love of God, the ideal True, Just, Loving, and 
Holy, involving as it does the religious love of men. 
In short, that will be a society shaped by the Golden 
Rule. 

But the society of atheism must be a mutuality of 
selfishness ; a society of bodies without souls ; ruled by 
selfishness, not conscious affection ; for an earth with- 
out a heaven, in a world without a God ; and in a 
world, too, without actual reverence, which comes in- 
stinctively into every person above the rank of the idiot ; 
! — for with atheists reverence must take either the out- 
ward form of servility and baseness, or the inward form 
of gross self-esteem. So this must be a short-sighted 
selfishness, which lays out for to-day, but never lays up 
for to-morrow. 

Each conjunction of selfishness must needs be a battle. 
The individual is a warfare of contending passions, lust 
striving against acquisitiveness, and ambition against 
amativeness. The family must be a warfare of men 
and women striving for mastery. Society must be a 
warfare of great and little, of cunning and foolish, rich 
and poor, cultivated and ignorant, — contending for 
mastery. Amongst all these, the strong passion will 
carry it in the individual, the strong person in the family, 
and the strong class in society ; and therefore no peace 
is at all possible till the strong passion has subdued the 
weak in the individual, the strong man the weak men 
in the family, and the strong class has got its heel on 
the throat of the weak class in society. Then there 



56 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



will be unity, and the conquering passion will proclaim 
peace where it has made a solitude. The social aim 
will be to rule over others, and make them serve you ; 
to give them the least and get the most from them ; 
and then he will be thought the most fortunate man 
and so the most " respectable " in the community, and 
" honorable " in the state, who does the least service foi 
mankind, and gets the most pay and the most powei 
from them. Society will be controlled by selfish pro- 
pensities, not moral ideas, affectional feelings, or relig- 
ious aspirations for ideal perfection. 

See how this principle will work practically in social 
affairs. Such is the distribution of faculties amongst 
men that a few persons always control the mass of men. 
We may deny this because we are Democrats, but it is 
a fact which everywhere stares us in the face. It is so 
with gregarious animals: the strong barnyard-fowl is 
always cock of the walk, and rules the roost just as he 
will, only as he has but a small margin of individual 
oscillation, little individual caprice, he rules according to 
the law of his nature, not the caprice of his will. The 
actual preponderance of the few men over the many has 
hitherto prevailed in every form of state government, 
whether it be called a despotism, an aristocracy, or a 
republic. Six hundred men, self-appointed almost, 
meet together in two Conventions at Baltimore, and 
select two men, and then say to the people, — " One of 
these is to be your President for four years." And the 
twenty millions fling up their caps and say which of the 
two it shall be ; and the majority thinks it has made 
the President. If the conventions had selected two 
notorious kidnappers, — the Philadelphia kidnapper on 
one side, and the Boston kidnapper on the other, — one 
of these would as assuredly be President as either of the 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



57 



actual nominees will be. This, I say, is so at present. 
It is a fact all over the world, in Republics as well as in 
Despotisms. The political " democrat " has commonly 
been also a despot. 

But the principle on which atheistic society must 
needs be founded will be that of mere private selfish- 
ness. So all the rulers must of necessity be tyrants, 
ruling with cruel and selfish aims. Oppression, which 
is a Measure in the practice of men, must be also a 
Principle in the theory of the atheist, the accidental 
actual of human history will then become the substan- 
tial icleal of human nature. The most appropriate nom- 
ination in that case would be the nomination of the kid- 
nappers. The capitalist wishes to operate by his 
money ; that is his tool to increase his power of selfish 
enjoyment. The operative wishes to act by his hand 
and head ; these are his tools to increase his power of 
selfish enjoyment. But both must be thoroughly selfish 
in principle, and so they will be natural and irrecon- 
cilable enemies waging a war for mutual extermination. 
Accordingly the capitalist will aim to get the operatives' 
work without giving them his money ; and the opera- 
tives will aim to get the capitalist's money without 
giving him their work ; and so there will be a perpetual 
" strike " and warfare between the two, each contin- 
ually laying at the other with all his might. The har- 
mony of society will be the equilibrium of selfishness ; 
and that will be brought about when the strong has 
crushed down the weak, has got him under his foot and 
has destroyed him. Harmony will take place when the 
last spider has eaten up all his coadjutors. The social 
peace of atheism is solitude. 

In trade the aim will be to accumulate money, — no 
matter how it is got, by fraud, by lies, by rack-rent on 



58 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



houses, by ruinous usury on land, or less ruinous piracy 
on the sea. The man will allow nothing to stand be- 
tween him and the dollar he covets, no intellectual idea, 
no moral principle, no affectional feeling, no religious 
emotion. Mr. New England is greedy for money; 
Mr. South Carolina greedy for slaves. Mi*. New Eng- 
land steals men in Africa, or in Massachusetts, and 
sells them to his brother, Mr. South Carolina, getting 
great pay. You say to both of these, This is very 
wrong; it is inhuman, it is wicked. But the atheists 
say, " What do we know about right and wrong ? " 
" I only know," says Mr. New England, " it brings me 
money." " I only know it brings me slaves," says Mr. 
South Carolina. " All we want is money and slaves." 
You can have nothing further to say to these two gen- 
tlemen. 

Mr. Salem sends cargoes of rum to Africa, and when 
it gets there dilutes it with half its bulk of water, drugs 
it to its old intoxicating power, and then sells it to the 
black man, who is made just as drunk, and a little more 
poisoned than if he had the genuine article, the only 
thing to which New England has characteristically 
given its name. He sells this to the black man, and 
sells him also powder and balls to use in capturing his 
brother men ; and when they are caught he " prudently " 
leaves some other American to take and transport them 
to market at Rio, or Cuba, with the sanction of the 
American government. You say to Mr. Salem, This 
is all wicked. " What do I care for that ? " says he. 
" It brings me very good money, very good honor, the 
first respectability. You do n't think it's righteousness 
I am trading for, that I baptize Negroes with poisoned 
rum for the sake of their ' Salvation ! ' I leave that 
matter and the ' Justification of Slavery ' to the Chris- 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



59 



tian clergy. It is quite enough for the merchant to 
make slaves ; I leave it to the ministers to prove it is 
right. You think I am aiming at ' Heaven,' do you ? 
You are very young, Sir ! " 

But, say you, you are false to your natural obligations 
to do right, to speak true, to feel kind, and to be holy. 
" Obligations of that sort ! " adds he, " I know no such 
obligations. This is consciousness without a con- 
science." At least you must fear the judgment passed 
against wrong in the next life ! — say you, almost driven 
to your last appeal. " But I know no next life," says 
he ; " here is the present life ; I am sure of that." But 
at least you reverence God? " Not at all," says Mr. 
Salem, " it is a w T orld without a Gocl ! " 

If a man starts with such a theory of the universe, and 
such principles of practice, what can you say to him ? 
Call on that man for heroism when your country is in 
danger, and he creeps under the oven. Call on him for 
charity when the country is starving, and he sells bread 
for a dollar a pound. You can get nothing from him 
but selfishness. An atheistic community could not 
build a free School-house, or an Alms-house, or a Hos- 
pital, only a Jail. Behold atheism carried into society ! 

Now, as I said the other day, there is not much ac- 
knowledged speculative atheism, — acknowledged to 
one's self, — but there is a great deal of partial practical 
atheism, which lets houses at rack-rent, to the ruin of 
the tenant ; which lets money at rack-usury, to the ruin 
of the borrower ; sells rum to the ruin of the buyer ; it 
deals falsely in honorable goods, — there may be as 
much baseness in the dealing, as danger in the merchan- 
dise, — and then with the profits it builds up great 
houses, which are palaces for selfishness. I look on 



60 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



them as on the rude hovels of the buccaneers of Ja- 
maica and the Caribbees, who went down to the shore 
of the Spanish main and murdered the crews of the 
ships they took, and then carried the ships to port and 
broke them to pieces to build up their own houses from 
the fragments. You ask these men to forbear from 
destroying their brothers. You appeal to their human- 
ity, — and they are true to their practical atheism. 
You appeal to justice, — they know it not; to respect 
for conscience, — they have none of it ; to their con- 
sciousness of God, — they recognize no such thing. 
Tell these men of some absolute right, of their immor- 
tal soul, — it is all a dream. 

Am I speaking mere fictions ? When Boston had 
kidnapped Thomas Sims, and carried him away, two 
members of a Christian church in this city, both mer- 
chants, met accidentally in its chief business street, and 
talked the matter over. Both disliked the deed ; but 
one thus justified it, and said, " If we did n't do this we 
should n't get any more trade from the South, and I 
remember we have got to live here? " So do I," said 
the other, " remember we have got to live hereafter "." 
There were practical atheism and practical religion 
looking one another in the face. Boston went to the 
side of practical atheism, as you know, thinking, as her 
prominent ministers declared, there was no " Higher 
Law." 

There is a great deal of social practical atheism 
which appears under the guise and with the name of 
religion. This is the most ghastly, the most deadly 
kind. It is concealed, — a wolf in sheep's clothing ; still 
a wolf, and his jaws are there under the innocent covering 
of the lamb. It is Satan transformed " into an angel of 



PEACTICAL ATHEISM. 



61 



light," but still the old devil, spite of usurping the 
angel's wings. The more consistent atheist will join 
the church. 

Here is an example of that. A man of property in 
this city dishonestly failed ; dishonestly, and yet legally 
became a bankrupt ; paid his creditors sixpence or a 
shining on the dollar ; and secured to himself consid- 
erable property, getting a discharge from all his cred- 
itors except one. Afterwards he became rich. The 
poor man who had refused to compound his debt 
claimed his due. The rich man did not deny that it 
was justly due, only declared it was not legally due. 
There was no redress. At length our defaulting debtor 
" experienced religion," as they say ; — I call it experi- 
encing theology, and very poor theology besides ; " ex- 
perienced religion " at one of the sectarian churches of 
Boston, — and became what is there called " a religious 
man ; " and came up before a communion table, and pro- 
fessed to commune with God, and Christ, and Man, 
through the elements of bread and wine. Our pool- 
creditor goes to him again, and says, " Now I hope you 
will pay me, since you have become a £ religious man ' 
and have joined the church." Quoth the debtor, " Busi- 
ness is business, and religion is religion. Business is 
for the week and religion for Sunday " — and paid him 
not a cent. There was social practical atheism in the 
guise of religion, all the more consistent in that garb. 

Sometimes practical atheism gets into the pulpit as 
well as the pews, and then it is tenfold more deadly ; 
for it poisons the wells of society, and next diffuses the 
contents abroad as the waters of life. It cries out, 
" Ho ! every one that thirsteth, come up here and be 
comforted in your sins. Slavery is a Christian Institu- 
tion." Ask such a man, of that denomination, to preach 

6 



62 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



against any popular wickedness which shakes the stee- 
ple over his head, and which jars the great Bible on his 
pulpit's lid ; ask him to preach against wickedness which 
turns one half his congregation into voluptuaries, — 
victims of passion, — and the other half into hunkers, — 
victims of ambition, — and he only cries, " Save us, 
Good Lord ! " Tell him of some noble excellence that 
is going abroad into society, and is ready to be struck 
down by the wickedness of the world, and ask him to 
speak only a word in its favor over the cushions of his 
pulpit, and he mumbles, " Miserable Offenders ! Save 
us, Good Lord." That is all he can say. 

All these practically deny the Higher Law. I am 
not speaking of momentary errors. You all know I am 
far more charitable than most men to all errors of that 
sort. I know myself how easy it is to do wrong ; how 
many depraved things may be done without any de- 
pravity in the human heart. But atheism of this sort, 
disguised or undisguised, — I cannot express the abhor- 
rence and loathing that I feel for the thing. Offences 
are one thing, but the theory which makes offences — 
that is the baser thing. 

Look about you and see how much there is, however, 
of practical atheism not confessed to itself. The Sad- 
ducee comes forward and says, " There is no Angel, 
nor Resurrection ; " and men cry out " Atheist ! " 
" Away with him ! " The Pharisee devours widows' 
houses, and then struts into the temple, drops with 
brassy ring his shekel into the public chest, and stands 
before the seven golden candlesticks and prays, " God, 
I thank thee that I am not as other men are, extor- 
tioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I 
fast twice in the week ; I give tithes of all that I pos- 
sess." Men cry out, " This is a Saint ! a great Chris- 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



63 



tian ! " — and ran over the poor widow who is dropping 
into the alms-box her two mites, all the living that she 
has, and tread her down. This practical social atheism 
is the death of all heroism, all manliness, all beauty, all 
love. 

IV. See this practical atheism in the Political Form, 
in the Nation. The normal motive of national union 
is the gregarious instinct and the social will, acting in 
their larger modes of operation, and joining men by- 
mutuality of interest, and mutuality of love. This is 
the foundation of all real patriotism. Then the union 
will be for the sake of the universal good of all, and the 
particular good of each. National institutions, consti- 
tutions, and statutes will be the result of a national 
desire for what is useful to-day, and for what is abso- 
lutely true, just, lovely, and holy. There will be a co- 
ordination of the particular desire of Thomas and Jane, 
each seeking his own special good in the action of per- 
sonal self-love ; and of the general desire of the nation 
seeking the united good of all in the joint action of self- 
love and of benevolence. All of this let me represent 
by one word, Justice, a symbol alike of the transient 
and eternal interests of both all and each. All national 
statutes will come from the conscience of the nation, 
which aims to make them so as to conform with the 
conscience of God, as that is shown in the constitution 
of the Universe, in the unchanging laws of Human 
Nature, which represent the Justice and the Love of 
God. Then every statute will be a part of the intrinsic 
law of human nature writ out in human speech, and 
laid down as a rule of conduct for men. Every such 
statute will be human and conventional in its form, but 
yet divine and absolute in its substance, as all true sci- 



64 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



ence is the divine and absolute Fact of Nature ex- 
pressed in human speech. Then the reason for obeying 
the human statutes will be the natural obligation to 
speak true, do right, feel kind, and be holy ; for so far 
as the statutes of men represent the natural law of God, 
obedience is moral, and it is obligatory on all to observe 
them ; but beyond this point obedience to those stat- 
utes is obligatory on no man, but is immoral, unmanly, 
and wicked. 

But the politics of practical atheism must be based 
on selfishness. As selfishness obtains in the individual, 
establishing a personal anarchy of desires ; in the family, 
establishing a domestic anarchy of its members ; in the 
community, establishing a social anarchy in the classes 
thereof; so it must prevail in the state, establishing a 
national anarchy in its various parts. Political moral- 
ity is impossible in the atheistic state ; there can be 
only political economy, which aims to provide merely 
for the selfishness of men. For by this hypothesis, 
there is a body without a soul, a here but no hereafter, 
a world without a God. Men will be consciously held 
together, in a negative manner, by the mutual and uni- 
versal repulsion of selfishness, not at all, positively, by 
the mutual and universal attraction of Justice. All 
men will be natural enemies, joined by mutual hatred, 
huddled together by Want and Fear. 

Government is a contrivance whereby a few men 
control the rest. In a democracy, the majority of the 
people determine what great or little man shall perform 
this function ; or rather they think they determine this, 
and at least can say who shall not officially attempt 
this function. In a despotism the majority have not 
that privilege — but the great or little man himself de- 
termines who shall control the nation. In the state of 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



65 



practical atheism, in either case, the government must 
be one of selfishness — the controlling power seeking 
the most for itself and the least for the people. So the 
government will be a tyranny, representing only the 
selfishness of the ruling power. In all cases the appeal 
must be to Superior Force — to that as the proximate 
appeal, to that the ultimate. Now it will be Force of 
Body, then Force of Cunning, The government may 
assume various forms, — the controlling power may be 
a king, a monarchy of selfishness ; a few great families, 
an aristocracy of selfishness ; or the majority, a democ- 
racy of selfishness : but the substance is still the same, 
— tyranny and despotism, subjecting the world to mon- 
archic, aristocratic, or democratic force ; a rule of the 
strong over the weak, and against the transient and per- 
manent interests of the weak. To the individual whose 
natural rights are destroyed, it is of small consequence 
whether the destroyer is single-headed, several-headed, 
or many-headed. Political atheism in one, in few, or 
in many, is still the same. 

Special maxims and special aims will vary with 
special forms of government. Is the controlling power 
a monarch, he will say, u The king can do no wrong," 
and above all things will aim to protect the conven- 
tional privilege of kings. Is it an aristocracy of long 
descent, the maxim will be, " Birth before Merit ; " " the 
nobility cannot err." They will make all the power of 
the people serve to rock the cradle for men of famous 
line, scorning the common mortal's "puddle-blood." 
Is it a company of capitalists, the maxim will be 
" Property, before persons ; " " let the State take care of 
the rich, and they will take care of the people ; " " money 
can do no wrong." They will aim to oppress the poor 
and make them servants, serfs, or slaves. Is it the mob 

6* 



66 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



of proletaries, "Property is theft;" "the majority can 
do no wrong ; " " Minorities have no rights," will be the 
maxim, and to plunder the rich the aim. 

Political atheism is the exploitation of the people, — 
by the selfishness of the king, the nobles, or the majority; 
all right must yield to might. There is no moral ele- 
ment in the laws — in making, administering, or obeying 
them ; for atheism itself knows no obligation, no duty, 
no right, only force and desire. All government is a 
reign of terror. 

In the atheistic state there must be another class. 
As the formal negation of atheism, and the affirmation 
of the opposite thereof, is one form of its practical pro- 
fession, so the Priesthood of Atheism, an atheistic clergy, 
is philosophically as possible, and historically as real, 
as the monarchy, the aristocracy, or the democracy of 
atheism. The clergy will be the ally of the tyrant, the 
enemy of the oppressed, of the poor, the ignorant, the 
servant, the serf, the slave. In the name of the Soul 
which it rejects, of the Hereafter which it denies, of the 
God whom it derides, the Atheistic Church will declare, 
" There is no law above the pleasure of King Monarch, 
or King Many. Obey or be damned." So in the 
atheistic state the atheistic church will be supple to 
the master, and hate the slave ; will cringe to power, 
and abhor all which appeals to the Eternal Right ; will 
love empire, and hate piety. Now it will praise royalty, 
now nobility, now riches, now numbers, claiming always 
that the actual power holds by divine right ; quoting 
Scripture to show it. This is the most odious form 
of practical political atheism, — the negation of itself, 
the affirmation of its opposite ; crushing man while it 
whines out its litany — " Save us, good Lord, miserable 
offenders." 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



67 



Hobbes of Malmesbury, was right when he said 
" Atheism is the best ally of despotism," for it denies 
the reality of Justice ; takes Conscience out of human 
consciousness, the soul out of the body, Hereafter away 
from here, and dismisses God from the universe — 
selfishness the only motive, force the last appeal. That 
politician was a crafty man who said of religion — " in 
politics it makes men mad," for it bids them speak true, 
do right, feel kind, and be holy against the consent of 
governments when they stand in its way. Alexander 
at a feast slew Clitus, both drunk with Bacchic wine. 
One of the flatterers, not drunk but sober, said " It is 
all right ; there is no law above the king ! " That was 
practical political atheism — the sober flatterer exalting 
a drunken murderer above the eternal God ; the excep- 
tional measure of a king, raging with wine and anger, 
was made a universal principle for all time. 

Here in this nation there is much partial practical 
atheism in the political form. Look at the corruption, 
the bribery of eminent men, sometimes detected, ac- 
knowledged, and vindicated ; at the conduct of political 
parties, no one seeking to govern the nation for the 
joint good of all the citizens, only for the peculiar 
good of the party in power; at the tyranny of the 
majority, striking down the obvious right of the 
lesser number ; at three million men made slaves by 
the people of America: — what is it all but partial 
practical atheism ? I am glad political men boldly 
declare the speculative principle which lies at the basis 
of their practical measures and tell the people, " There 
is no Natural Law above the statutes which men 
enact : " no God above King Monarch, or King Many. 
I am glad they " define their position," all atheistic as 



C3 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



it is. Look at the political and clerical defences of the 
most enormous public wickedness, and you see how 
deep this practical atheism has gone down into the 
people, how widely it has spread. But the hope which 
I have for this nation is built on the Character of God, 
and on the consciousness of God in the people's heart. 

Y. You may see how practical atheism must work 
in the form of General Human Life, the Life of the 
Human Race taken as a whole. Mankind is a Family 
of Nations, amenable to the constitution of the universe, 
and normally to be ruled by the laws of human nature, 
by Justice, — by the moral obligation to speak true, to 
do right, feel kind, and be holy. As the members in 
the body form a harmonious person ; as the individuals 
in a house form a harmonious family ; as the families 
in society form a harmonious community ; as the com- 
munities in a nation form a harmonious state ; so the 
nations in the earth are to form a harmonious World, 
with human unity of action for all, with national variety 
of action for each state, social variety of action for each 
community, domestic for each family, and individual 
for each person. Justice is to be the rule of conduct 
for individual, domestic, social, national, and general 
human conduct. Thus the ideal of human life in these 
five forms will be attained and maae actual. 

But practical atheism makes selfishness, material 
selfishness, the motive, and material desire the rule of 
conduct for the nations which make up the world, as 
for communities which compose the state, or for persons 
who join in families. So the World of atheism, like 
its state, society, family, and man, must be only an 
anarchy of conflicting elements, the strong plundering, 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



69 



enslaving, or killing the weak. The proximate and 
ultimate appeal will be to force, now force of body, 
then force of brain. 

Here I will not repeat what I have said before in 
another form ; but practical atheism will do on the 
large scale for the world what it did on the small in 
the state, community, and home. Each nation will be 
deemed its own exclusive cause, its own sustainer, 
director, mind, and providence. " There is no law of 
God above the nation's will," says the Atheist ; " no 
God above the peoples of the earth. Let us bite and 
devour one another." 

There is much practical atheism of this form in the 
world. See how Russia oppresses the feebler nations 
of the East and West. See how this great Anglo- 
Saxon tribe, with its American and its British head, 
invades the other feeble nations, — the yellow men in 
Asia and the islands of the sea, the red men in Amer- 
ica, and the black men in Africa. It is only practical 
atheism which in England justifies her treatment of 
Ireland, of India, China, Africa, and yet other re- 
gions of the world : in America it is only by practical 
atheism that we can vindicate our treatment of the 
Mexican and the Spaniard ; still more of the red man 
and the black. Atheism bids the powerful exploiter the 
weak — now with the sword alone — the heathen way 
of Rome ; now with commerce and the sword — the 
Christian way of the Anglo-Saxon. 

I would gladly say much more that burns in my 
bosom to be spoken, respecting atheism in its Political 
and General Human Form, atheism making laws, athe- 
ism crushing down the people. I would gladly show 
how this manifests itself in wicked wars. I could 
never look on an army invading another country to do 



70 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



it wrong, without asking, " Are the men who send the 
army abroad atheists before men, as well as before 
God ? " I would gladly speak of this in its Universal 
Form, — arraying nation against nation, making the 
strong tread down the weak. But yonder silent ringer 
warns me that I must not trespass too long. 

Speculative atheism is a thing human nature revolts 
at. So of speculative atheists, who have a full con- 
sciousness of complete atheism, there are at most but 
few ; I think not one. Practical atheism would be just 
as impossible, if one could be thoroughly conscious 
thereof. But without knowing it, there are men who 
thus act, and move, and live, and have their being, as 
if there were no God ; as if man had no soul ; as if there 
was. no special obligation to speak true, to do right, to 
feel kind, and to be holy. But there are many depraved 
things done which indicate no depravity in the man — 
excesses of instinct not yet understood, errors of passion 
untamed as yet, nay of ambition, not knowing itself. 
But there are depraved things which come out of con- 
scious and systematic wickedness, — the deliberate 
frauds of theology and trade, and the confessed wrong 
in domestic, social, national, and general human life. 
These are the fruits of practical atheism, though the 
man knows not what tree it is which bears them. 

We see atheism in two forms : One speculative, de- 
nying that there is any God. I shudder at that. I see 
men of large culture attempting to found schools of 
speculative atheism in this land. My bosom burns 
with pity and love for those men. Others may throw 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



71 



stones at them ; I shall throw none. Abuse enough 
from every hireling clergyman they will have, and every 
unreasonable sect ; they shall have no abuse from my 
lips ; for I see how the creed and the conduct of the 
churches of our land, and of the Christian world, have 
helped drive these men to their speculative atheism. 
Yet I am bound to warn every man against this ; 
against its beginning, for at first there is something 
rather attractive in the freedom of thought which it 
allows. Let us have all that freedom of thought and 
exercise every faculty of the intellect, and never fear. 
Little thought stops at Atheism ; much thought does 
not turn out of the way in that direction ; or if it do, it 
comes rounding home, and so returns to God. 

But I see practical atheism far more abundant, and 
far more dangerous ; by deeds, men denying there is 
any God, any soul, any everlasting life, any obligation 
to speak true, to do right, to feel kind, and to be holy. 
This is a sad sight. 

Speculative Atheism sits down, as I said last Sun- 
day, on the shore of Time, and the stream of Human 
History runs by, bearing the various civilizations, — 
Egyptian, East Indian, Chaldean, Grecian, Roman ; 
each seems a bubble, though it contains the birth and 
life, the groans unheard, the virtue unrewarded, the 
prayers unanswered, of millions of millions of men. 
Yet the remorseless stream, which comes from no 
whence, and goes to no whither, swallows all these down, 
— love umequited, heroism not paid, virtue unrewarded. 

Practical Atheism does not sit down in this way ; it 
goes out into the storm and tumult of active life, and 
there it stands, this Cerberus of selfishness, with its 
three heads ; — Lust, which hungers and barks after 
pleasure ; Ambition, that thirsts for fame and power ; 



72 



PRACTICAL ATHEISM. 



and Avarice, which is greedier than all the rest. And 
this monster of three heads stands there, making havoc 
of the individual, the family, the community, the church, 
the nation, and the world. 

But, thanks be to Almighty God! not only is the 
religious element so strong in us, but the moral and 
afTectional are so powerful, the intellectual so mighty, 
that human nature must stop a great ways this side of 
complete Atheism. A body without a soul, a here but 
no hereafter, a history without a plan, an earth without 
a heaven, a universe but no God — no man can have a 
realizing sense of it and live. Only let us be warned in 
season, and freely develop the moral, afTectional, and 
religious faculties 3 and have their blest reward. 



SERMON III. 

OF THE POPULAR THEOLOGY, AS THEORY. 

7 TO 



MATTHEW XV. 9. 

TEACHING FOR DOCTRINES THE COMMANDMENTS OF MEN. 
(74) 



III. 



OF THE POPULAR THEOLOGY OF CHRISTENDOM, 
REGARDED AS A THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. 



On the last two Sundays I spoke of Atheism. First 
of Atheism as Philosophy, — a theory of the universe ; 
and next of atheism as Ethics — a principle of prac- 
tical life. To-day I ask your attention to a sermon 
of the Popular Theology of Christendom, regarded as 
Philosophy, a theory of the universe ; and next Sun- 
day I hope to speak of it as Ethics, a principle of 
practice. 

From the beginning of human history there has been 
a progressive development of all the higher faculties of 
man ; of the religious powers, which connect man with 
God, as well as of the other faculties, which connect 
man with the material universe and men with one 
another. There has been a progress in Piety, in Moral- 
ity, and in the Theories of these two. Of course, then, 
there has been a progress in the visible results of this 
development of the religious faculties. The progress 
appears in the rise, decline, and disappearance of vari- 
ous forms of religion. Each of these has been neces- 
sary to the welfare of the human race ; for at one time 

(75) 



76 



THE POPULAK THEOLOGY. 



it represented the highest religious development of the 
persons who embraced that form of religion. Some- 
times it was a sect ; sometimes a nation ; sometimes a 
great assemblage of nations : but in each case the form 
of religion which the people accepted represented the 
highest development of the religious faculties of those 
people at that time. As the science of a nation repre- 
sents its intellectual development, so the form of relig- 
ion shows how far men have got on in their piety and 
morality. But as each form of religion, when it is once 
established, is a thing which is fixed and does not 
change, and as the religious faculties are not fixed, but 
go on with increasing power from age to age, so it hap- 
pens that men must necessarily outgrow any specific 
and imperfect form of religion whatever, just as they 
outgrow each specific and imperfect form of science. 
Human nature continually transcends the facts of hu- 
man history, so new schemes of science, new forms of 
religion continually crowd off the old. 

This work of making a form of religion, and then 
outgrowing it and making a new one is continually 
going on. On a small scale it takes place in you and 
me, who are constantly transcending to-day the form of 
religion which satisfied us yesterday ; it takes place on 
a large scale in the human race as a whole. Some- 
times a man distinctly and suddenly breaks with his 
form of religion, or no religion, and takes a new one. 
Sometimes a nation does so. This is called a Conver- 
sion of the individual, a Reformation of the nation ; in 
either case it is a Revolution in religion. But in gen- 
eral there is nothing sudden or abrupt about this ; the 
whole change takes place silently and slowly, with no 
crisis of revolution ; but insensibly, little by little, the 
boy's religion passes away and the man's religion takes 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



77 



its place. A nation improves in its religion as in its 
• agriculture, its manufactures, its commerce, and its 
modes of travelling; and the improvement is not by a 
leap, which Nature abhors, but by a gradual sliding 
upwards, almost insensible. It has been so with the 
human race. 

Two thousand years ago our fathers in the heart of 
Europe were Pagans. Ten or twelve hundred years 
ago they put off their Paganism and accepted Papal 
Christianity. Three hundred years ago they put off 
Papal Christianity and accepted Protestant Christian- 
ity. Each of these obvious changes, from Paganism to 
Papacy, from Papacy to Protestantism, was sudden and 
violent, a crisis of revolution. But before that crisis 
came about, a yet greater change had taken place, 
silently and slowly, the Pagans getting ready for Papal- 
ism, and the Catholic getting ready for Protestantism. 
That was unobserved. First they grew up to Pagan- 
ism, then to Papal Christianity, and then to Prot- 
estant Christianity. • Shall mankind stop at Paganism ? 
at Papal Christianity ? at Protestant Christianity ? 
You and I may perversely stop, we may stand still, - — 
at least try to do so ; but mankind never stops. The 
soul of the human race constantly unfolds ; it does not 
pause. Like the stars in then courses without haste 
and without rest it goes ever on. There is a continual 
and silent change taking place at this day, and it must 
for ever take place. It is not possible for the human 
race to stand still in its religious development ; no more 
than for the matter of the Earth to cease to attract the 
Moon and be itself attracted thereby. 

The leading nations of the Caucasian race have thus 
far outgrown, first, the savages' rude Fetichistic wor- 
ship ; then classic Heathenism ; then patriarchal Deism ; 

7* 



78 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



then the Mosaic worship of Jehovah ; and now the 
most enlightened portion thereof have come to what is 
called " Christianity." That is the form of religion 
which they have reached to-day. Shall we stop with 
the present form of religion called " Christianity ? " 
Mankind never surrenders to time. There is a progress 
in what is called Christianity, a continual change of the 
thing, though the name abides the same. Protestant- 
ism is clearly, on the whole, a step in advance of Ca- 
tholicism — and Protestantism has advanced very much 
since the death of Martin Luther. A change is going 
on at this day within Catholicism and Protestantism. 

What is called Christianity embraces three things, 
namely : first Sentiments, next Ideas, and third Actions. 
It is chiefly of the Ideas that I shall speak to-day. 
These Ideas united together I shall call the Popular 
Theology. 

This Popular Theology is not wholly nor in chief the 
work of Jesus of Nazareth, or of his immediate follow- 
ers ; for, though called by his name, it is no more his 
production than modern philosophy is the production of 
Socrates, or modern medicine the production of Galen. 
What is called Christianity in this sense, — the Popular 
Theology I mean, — is the result of the religious and 
philosophical development of mankind up to this day. 
The development of mankind — in matters pertaining 
to the sentiment of religion, the idea of religion, the 
practice of religion, — has gone on a great deal more 
rapidly since the time of Jesus than before or at his 
time. The change which is now taking place in the 
religious world — the change in the sentiments of relig- 
ion, the ideas of religion, and the actions of religion — 
is greater by far than the change from Judaism or Hea- 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



79 



thenism to the Christianity of Paul and Tertullian. I 
mean to say distinctly that between the Ideas of the 
foremost religious men of this, age and the popular the- 
ology of the churches, there is a greater chasm, a wider 
and deeper gulf, than there was between the ideas of 
Saint Paul or Tertullian and those of the Jews and Pa- 
gans who were around them. 

If Jesus of Nazareth were to come back and preach 
his ideas of theology as he set them forth in Judea, they 
would not be accepted as Christianity. I think no one 
of the apostles even would be thought Christian in any 
church in the world. For, first, there has been a real 
progress of mankind since their day ; and the average 
preachers have dropped some errors of the apostles, and 
have got some new truths pertaining to the sentiment, 
the idea, and the action of religion ; and thus there has 
been a real progress in religious growth. 

But then again there has been a change without any 
progress, as well as a change with progress; and the 
caprice of individuals of to-day has taken the place of 
the caprice of the individuals who lived ten, twelve, or 
eighteen hundred years ago — one error taking the place 
of another. A change of caprice does not always indi- 
cate a progress ; but the acceptance of new truths — of 
sentiment, of idea, and of action, — does represent a real 
progress. 

This progress has been influenced very much by the 
genius of certain great men, some of them remarkable 
for feelings of piety, some for ideas of philosophy, some 
for actions of philanthropy. Jesus of Nazareth has had 
an immense influence in giving mankind a start in the 
direction which has been taken since his time. When 
he declared that love of God and love of Man was the 
sum of human duty to God and to man, then he made 



80 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



a statement which can never be gainsaid, nor tran- 
scended, for in that he came upon the eternal substance 
of religion. That idea can no more fade out of the re- 
ligious consciousness of mankind than the multiplica- 
tion table be dispensed with in Mathematics, the Alpha 
bet in Literature, or the continent of America fail and 
be left out of the Geographies which describe the Earth. 
Jesus of Nazareth appears to have summed up religion 
in these two things, namely, — in Piety, the love of 
God ; and Morality, the keeping of the laws of God, 
and especially in keeping the law which commands us 
to love our brother as ourselves. But that is at the 
present day thought to be a very small part of Chris- 
tianity ; and it is thought in all the great sects, Cath- 
olic or Protestant, to be the least important part thereof. 

I do not mean to say that I think Jesus had a com- 
plete and analytic comprehension of all which is in- 
cluded in his own words, nor that he did not demand 
other things inconsistent therewith, only that he made 
Love to God and Man, the chief thing in his religious 
teaching. I make a distinction between his theology 
and his religion. His theology seems to have had many 
Jewish notions in it, wholly untenable in our day, though 
commonly accepted by wise men in his. It was in his 
religion that he surpassed his age. 

If any one of the gospels, or if all of them represent 
his thoughts correctly, then his theology contained a 
considerable mixture of error, which indeed is obvious 
to any man who will read those records without pre- 
judice. With those works in our hands it would be 
absurd to maintain that Jesus entertained no theolog- 
ical error, in matters of importance; that he had all 
theologic truth ; or all the theologic truth known to any 
or all persons of his own time. From the time of 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



SI 



Moses to Jesus there was a large intellectual and relig- 
ious development of mankind, a marked progress in the 
religious sentiments, ideas, and actions of individual: 
men, and of the leading nations of mankind. From the 
time of Jesus to our time this progress, both in indi- 
viduals and in nations, has been yet more rapid. Old 
errors have been cast away, new truths have been added 
to the consciousness of mankind. The theology of the 
most eminent Catholics or Protestants at this day rep- 
resents the thought of Jesus as it appears in the oldest 
of the four Gospels, no more than a common plough 
represents the thought of the man who first broke up 
ground with oxen. No man is so great as mankind. 
If the great genius at first is so far before his brothers 
as to be incomprehensible, by and by they overtake him, 
pass by him, and go still further on till they become in- 
comprehensible to the man who stands where the genius 
once stood. I know it is thought very wicked to say 
this in its application to the historical development of 
religion, as it would be thought very foolish to deny it 
in its application to the historical development of 
agriculture, manufactures, or commerce, to any science, 
to any art. Every great genius for religion will add 
new facts to the world's experience of religion, just as 
much since the death of Jesus as before his time. The 
road is easier after a saint has trod it, and no saint 
travels the whole length thereof. 

Look at the Ideas of Christendom, the doctrines. 
There is one great scheme of doctrines called " Chris- 
tian Theology." It contains some things held in com- 
mon with every other system of theology that has ever 
been; they are the generic element of the popular the- 



82 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



ology. Then it contains likewise other things peculiar 
to itself, which do not belong to any other form of relig- 
ion ; these are the specific element of the popular the- 
ology. The first denote the agreement thereof with 
other schemes of theology, and the next its difference 
therefrom. 

This great scheme of theology is common to all 
Christendom as a whole, with few individual exceptions. 
The Christians in general agree in a belief of this com- 
mon theology, and are thereby distinguished from men 
of all other modes of religion. The Protestant has 
departed from the Catholic theology a little, separating 
therefrom on the question of the authority and functions 
of the Church — the Protestant affirming the power of 
the individual as against the power of the great body 
of Christians. The Unitarian has separated from other 
Protestants in his doctrine as to the arithmetic of the 
Godhead, reducing the deity to one denomination, in- 
stead of three which the Trinitarians affirm. The Uni- 
versalist differs from the rest in his doctrine of the final 
destination of man. But still the great " body of divin- 
ity," — the mass of doctrines called " Christian theol- 
ogy," and " Christianity," — has escaped untouched, at 
least unhurt by Protestants, — Unitarians or Univer- 
salists. So Protestants and Catholics, Unitarians and 
Trinitarians, Universalists and Partialists, agree in the 
main parts of their theology : they all substantially 
unite in their idea of God, their idea of Man, and their 
idea of the Relation between God and Man. The root 
is the same, the trunk the same, the fruit the same in 
kind, only the branches are unlike in their form, and 
direction. 

Some of these doctrines, called Christian, were old 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



83 



at the time of Jesus ; some were new at that time : 
— some of these latter were, doubtless, added by Jesus 
himself ; others by his followers ; — a great many have 
been added since that age, taken either from the tran- 
sient caprice of men, or from the permanent truths 
which man has arrived at. 

Take an example of the doctrines since formed out 
of the transient caprice of men, and then regarded as 
Christian. 

First it was declared that the "immaculate concep- 
tion," the supernatural birth of Jesus, should be a doc- 
trine of the Church. This has become fixed in the 
Church, and there has been no sect for sixteen hundred 
years at least, venturing to deny it. All sects, even in- 
cluding the Unitarian and Universalist, affirm the super- 
natural birth of Jesus — that he had no human father ; 
or are supposed to affirm it, stoutly enough denouncing 
such as doubt or deny it. 

Then men went further and affirmed the supernatural 
birth of Mary, the Mother of Jesus ; and, after twelve 
or thirteen hundred years, that became a doctrine fixed 
in the Catholic Church which had two "immaculate 
conceptions." But at the Reformation the Protestant 
churches rejected this latter doctrine with all their might, 
staving it off with both hands, thinking it as great an 
error to believe the supernatural birth of the mother as 
to doubt that of the son. 

Men did not stop there ; they went further, and 
presently declared the supernatural birth of the Mother 
of Mary to be an essential doctrine, — and they called 
that mother Anna. That idea is now in the process 
of fixation ; it is getting formulated, — to use a philo- 
sophical phrase. That is to say, it has been accepted 
by a portion of the Catholic Church ; and some of the 



84 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



leaders are now insisting that it shall become a fixed 
doctrine, a point of Catholic theology which all are to 
believe, or " perish everlastingly." 

This process of doctrinization by caprice may go 
on ; there is no reason it should stop here. By and by 
it may be said that the Grandmother, the Great-grand- 
mother, and the Great-great-grandmother were all born 
supernaturally ; and then in addition to Anna, the 
fictitious mother of Mary, there may be a Joanna, a 
Rosanna, a Roxanna, and a Susanna, and each of these 
declared to have a supernatural birth. It may become 
a doctrine of some future Church that a man must 
believe in all the seven " immaculate conceptions," or 
else " perish everlastingly." Why should Catholics 
stop with three while the Hindoos have so many ? 
There is no historical evidence that Jesus of Nazareth 
ever believed himself supernaturally born or his mother 
supematurally born ; and Anna, the mother of Mary, is 
a person as purely fictitious as Joanna, and Rosanna, 
and Roxanna, and Susanna, whom I have just invented. 
That is one example of the process of forming a doc- 
trine out of caprice and fixing it in the Church ; the 
popular theology contains many more. The Moham- 
medan theology equally abounds in doctrines derived 
from caprice. Nay, all the mythologies of the world 
are full of such fancies ; for human nature is the same 
in Gentile, Jew, and Christian. 

Some doctrines of Christian theology are Biblical, 
and were taught by Jesus ; some Biblical and were 
not taught by him. After the death of Jesus there 
was a great development of theological doctrines quite 
foreign to him, as any one may see who will read the 
book of Revelation, — which has very little religious 
feeling in it, — or the fourth Gospel, full of religious 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



85 



feeling, each containing a theology widely unlike that 
which is taught in the words of Jesus in the former 
three gospels ; nay, directly antagonistic thereto. But 
the greater part of what is called Christian theology is 
post-Biblical, and would be as strange to Paul and 
Apollos, as much of their teaching would be foreign 
to the ear of Jesus. Some of its doctrines at his time 
lay latent in the mind of the world, and have since 
become patent, so to say ; others have been added 
anew. 

In the popular theology there are comprised some of 
the greatest truths of religion which man has attained 
thus far. 

There is, for example, the doctrine of the Existence 
of God, as Creator and Governor of the world, a Being 
different in kind from matter, and from man. 

Next, there is the great doctrine of the Immortality 
of every man, and the certainty of retribution. 

As a third thing, there is the doctrine of the moral 
Obligation of every man to obey the Law of God. 

As a fourth thing, there is the doctrine concern- 
ing the Connection between Man and God, whereby 
man receives from God inspiration, guidance, and 
blessing. 

And as a fifth thing, it is affirmed that there is this 
Connection between man and man, — a duty on the 
part of one to love another, of all to love each, and of 
each to love all. 

These are great doctrines, of immense value to man- 
kind. 

I am by no means disposed to underrate science,, 
the grand achievements of human thought, which have 
brought the stars down to the astronomer's mirror, and. 

8 



86 



THE POPTJLAE THEOLOGY. 



have brought up to common knowledge the Little things 
which millions of years ago were laid away and em- 
balmed in the unchanging rock. Man has formulated 
the sky and knows the whereabouts of the stars ; has 
formulated the rock and knows the habits of the little 
insects which you find in a piece of slate from Berlin, 
in the chalk of Dover Cliff, in the sands under our feet, 
or in the slime that skirts our wharves as each receding 
tide goes out. All these are grand triumphs of human 
thought. But these five great doctrines which I have 
spoken of, — the existence of God, the immortality of 
man, the moral obligation of man to obey the law of 
God, the connection between man and God, and the 
connection of love between man and man, — these I 
think are by far the most important speculative doctrines 
known to the human intellect. 

But the popular theology has very great defects as a 
scheme of the universe, and it teaches great errors. 
Fifteen or sixteen hundred years ago Arnobius and 
Augustine, with other great teachers of Christianity, 
pointed out the follies of Heathenism in the most bitter 
polemics. It would be just as easy and just as appro- 
priate in bitter sermons, at this day, to point out the 
errors of the popular theology of the churches. I wish 
with no bitterness to expose the error. Bitterness is 
always out of place in philosophy, in theology, in phi- 
lanthropy. The Heathens before Christ meant to be 
right, and as a whole did the best they could ; and so 
the Christians after Christ have meant to be right, and 
have done the best they could as a whole. Aristotle 
and Augustine seem to me equally honest, and equally 
mistaken in many matters. Individuals have purposely 
gone wrong, but ninety-nine out of a hundred of the 



THE POPULAB THEOLOGY. 



87 



men who have Taught theology before Jesus or after 
him, it seems to me, meant to learn the truth and teach 
the truth. Let us thank all of these for the good they 
did, and let us do better if we can ; hoping that some- 
body, by and by, will come and do better than we, and 
will efface our errors, seeing truths clearly which we 
have but dimly seen, and the truths dimly which we 
have not seen at all. 

I say there are great errors in the popular theology 
of the Christian churches, regarded as a Theory of the 
Universe ; great errors in the Idea of God ; in the Idea 
of Man, and next in the Idea of the Relation between 
the two. 

L Look at the Idea of God. In the popular the- 
ology God is represented as a finite and imperfect God. 
It is not said so in words ; the contrary is often said ; 
nevertheless it is so. He is actually represented as im- 
perfect in power, imperfect in wisdom, imperfect in jus- 
tice, in love, and in holiness. It is so represented in 
facts, or alleged facts, related in the Bible, in the Old 
and New Testament both. It is so in the Catholic 
Church and the Protestant Church ; with the Unitarian 
and the Trinitarian, with the Partialist and the Univer- 
salist. 

In terms, religious writers very rarely speak of God 
as malignant, but they continually represent Him so in 
act. I say they rarely speak of God as malignant ; 
now and then a writer does. Some " divines " have 
distinctly declared that God was malignant; and not 
long ago, in a sister city of New England, a clergyman 
preached a sermon to his people with this title : " On 
the Malevolence of God ; " If you study the popular 



88 



THE POPULAK THEOLOGY. 



theology as a whole, you will find that it regards God 
as eminently malignant, though it does riot say so in 
plain words. The Tyrian idolaters, I think, called 
Baal merciful and beneficent, even when they thought 
he demanded the sacrifice of their children. 

According to the popular theology there are three 
acknowledged persons in the Godhead. 

First, there is " God the Father," the Creator of the 
universe, and all that is therein ; the great Being of the 
world, made to appear remarkable for three things, — 
first for great power to will and do ; second for great 
selfishness ; and third for great destructiveness. In the 
popular theology God the Father is the grimmest ob- 
ject in the universe ; not loving and not lovely. In the 
New Testament, in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and 
Luke, there are some dreadful qualities ascribed to God, 
which belonged to the Hebrew conception of Jehovah : 
but a great many exceeding kind and beautiful qualities 
are also assigned to Him ; — witness the Parable of the 
Prodigal Son ; witness many things put into the mouth 
of Jesus. The book of Revelation attributes to the 
Deity dark and malignant conduct which it is dreadful 
to think of. But the popular theology in the dreadful 
qualities assigned to God has gone a great ways be- 
yond the first three Gospels, and the book of Revelation. 
It has taken the dark things and made them blacker 
with notions derived from other sources. 

Then there is " God the Son," who is the Father in 
the flesh, but with more humanity in him, and with 
very much less selfishness and destructiveness than is 
attributed to the Father. Still in the popular theology 
the love which the Son bears towards man is always 
limited : first limited to Believers, and next to the Elect. 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



89 



It is no doctrine of the popular theology that Christ 
actually loves transgressors, and as little that God loves 
them. 

Then, thirdly, there is " God the Holy Ghost," the 
least important person in the Trinity, who continually 
" spreads undivided and operates unspent," but does 
not spread far or operate much, and is easily grieved 
away. The Holy Ghost is not represented as loving 
wicked men, that is, men who lack conventional faith, 
or who are deficient in conventional righteousness. No 
one of these three persons of the Godhead has any love 
for the souls of the damned. 

All this is acknowledged and writ down in the creeds 
of Catholic and Protestant, and in this they do not 
differ. A few heretical Unitarians have differed from 
the main church on the arithmetic of deity, not on the 
ethics or psychology thereof. 

It is commonly said there are only three persons in 
the Deity. But there is really a fourth person in the 
popular idea of God, in the Christian theology, to wit, 
the Devil ; for the Devil is really the fourth person of 
the popular Godhead in the Christian churches, only he 
is not so named and confessed. The belief in the devil 
is almost universal in Christendom. It is a New 
Testament doctrine, and an Old Testament doctrine. 
Catholic and Protestant, Trinitarian and Unitarian, 
Partialist and Universalist, agree in this. No Christian 
sect has ever denied his existence ; they cannot whilst 
they believe in the " Infallibility of the Scriptures." 
Says a writer of undoubted soundness, who represents 
the popular theology of the English and American sects, 
" The devil is the implacable enemy of the human race, 
and especially of believers, whom he desires to devour." 
He is represented as absolutely evil, without any good 

8* 



90 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



in him. When Origen, sixteen hundred years ago, de- 
clared that the devil would be saved in the final re- 
demption, if there were a spark of goodness in him, he 
was declared a heretic by the churches, and all Chris- 
tendom rung with accusations against him, because he 
thought the devil might be saved. It was a heresy in 
Robert Burns when he said he was loath to think of the 
pit of darkness even for the devil's sake, and wished he 
might " take a thought and mend." 

Well, now, this absolutely evil Devil, if there were 
such a being, must have come from God, who is the 
only Creator ; and of course, therefore, is as much a 
part of God's work and design as the Eternal Son after 
he was " eternally begotten," or the Eternal Holy Ghost 
after he had " eternally proceeded;" and the existence 
of the devil, therefore, is as much a work of God as the 
existence of the Son or the Holy Ghost ; and all the 
evil of the devil must have originated with God. God, 
therefore, must have made the devil absolutely evil, be- 
cause He wanted to make the devil absolutely evil. If 
the devil were made partially good, with a nature 
which, under the circumstances he was placed in, would 
develop into absolute evil — all of that must be so, be- 
cause God the Father wished it to be so. The devil 
must be "the implacable enemy of the human race," 
with this extraordinary appetite for " believers," because 
God wished him to be so. God therefore is responsible 
for the devil ; and the character of absolute evil, which 
is in the devil, must have been in God first. 

The power assigned to the devil and the influence 
over men commonly attributed to him, is much greater, 
since the creation, than that of all the three other Per- 
sons put together. And so the devil is really therefore 
the most effective person of the popular Godhead, only 



t 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



91 



not so confessed. There is no mistake in this reason- 
ing, strange as it may seem. It takes all these four 
Persons to make up and represent the popular theologi- 
cal notion of God. 

Then God as a whole is represented as angry with 
mankind as a whole. There is, on the one side, an 
offended God, and on the other an offending human 
race. God the Father is angry with mankind ; God 
the Son, and God the Holy Ghost are both angry with 
mankind ; and the devil, " the implacable enemy of the 
human race," as a roaring lion walks about seeking 
whom he may devour, " especially believers." 

But there are a few whom the devil will not be able 
to devour, who will be saved, whom the Holy Ghost 
will inspire, whom the Son will ransom and the Father 
bless. These are only the smallest fraction of man- 
kind, and the devil gets all the rest : so that really, ac- 
cording to the practical teaching of this theology, the 
devil, the unacknowledged person of the Godhead, is, 
after all, stronger than God the Father, God the Son, 
and God the Holy Ghost, all united. 

To speak of the deity as a Unit, God is represented 
as not working by law, that is, by a constant mode of 
operation — in the most important cases, — but by 
miracle. So God and the universe are not completely 
at one, but He acts in it by miracle ; that is, by an ir- 
regular and capricious mode of operation, reversing its 
laws; for example, in the Flood, in the storms and 
earthquakes of the material world, in the creation of 
woman, the birth of Jesus, the inspiration of the proph- 
ets and apostles. All these are theologically repre- 
sented as results of the spasmodic action of God, now 
a spasm of wrath, then of love. This theory does not 
properly belong to that idea of God — original perhaps 



92 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



with the Hebrews — which makes Him independent of 
matter and transcendent over it. Much better does it 
cohere with the notion of the classic deists, with whom 
God and Matter were both eternal and irreconcilable 
forces, always a little at feud. However the absurd 
theory has crept in to the Christian theology, where it 
appears yet more absurd than in the schemes of Socra- 
tes and Aristippus. 

The authors of the popular theology had no concep- 
tion of a uniformity of force, no conception of a univer- 
sal law, whereby God works in the world of matter and 
of spirit — in short, no conception of the Infinite God. 
So theologians make two forms of operations in the 
universe. One is the " work of Nature," by means of 
law — a constant mode of the operation of a constant 
force ; the other is the " work of Grace," by means of 
miracles — inconstant modes of the operation of an in- 
constant force. Wheat grows out of the ground by the 
law of Nature, and is not thought, in theology, emi- 
nently to show the goodness of God ; but when Jesus 
made, as it is said, five loaves feed five thousand men, 
besides women and children, and leave twelve baskets 
of broken bread, that is thought a miracle, a revelation 
of the immense power of God, which shows much more 
of his goodness than all the wheat that grows from 
the bosom of the earth, century out and century in, 
furnishing food for the whole human race! Newton 
writes the Principia of the Universe ; he writes by the 
" light of Nature " and describes only the " work of 
Nature," and his masterpiece is considered, theologi- 
cally, a small thing. St. Jude writes an epistle of twen- 
ty-five verses, and it is claimed that he wrote by the 
" light of miraculous inspiration ; " his book is a " work 
of Grace ;" a miracle ; and that poor production of Jude 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



93 



is thought to be incomparably greater than the Principia 
of Newton, with the Mecanique Celeste of La Place 
thrown in. " Newton and La Place," says this theolo- 
gy, " write by the carnal reason, and their works are 
fallible ; while Jiide wrote by miraculous inspiration, 
and his writings are infallible." 

The doctrine concerning Man is no better. Man is 
represented after this wise : He was so made by God 
and furnished with such surroundings that as soon as 
he tried to go alone he " fell from a state of innocence 
into a state of sin," and has transmitted " original sin " 
to all his posterity. Men are born with a sinful nature, 
and if not " totally depraved " they are so nearly so 
that the traction of goodness is infinitesimal and not 
worth estimating. Sin does not consist in sinning, but 
in being born of Adam after the fall ; for his offence 
wrought an attainder in the soul of all his children, for- 
ever. Man of himself, it is said, has no power to find 
out moral or religious truth, and to secure his own re- 
ligious or moral welfare. He is naturally wicked and 
hates God, hates other men, hates truth with his reason, 
justice with his conscience, love with his affections, 
holiness with his soul ; loves falsehood, injustice, hate, 
and wickedness, all for their own sake, not as means to 
an end ; — hates God the Father, God the Son, and 
God the Holy Ghost, and only loves the Devil. In his 
flesh there dwells no good thing. The natural desires 
are sinful, and men are first wicked by nature and next 
also by will. There is none that doeth good, not one. 
Men are evil and evil continually ; their heart is as 
prone to wickedness as the sparks to fly upward ; they 
are conceived in sin and shapen in iniquity. If they 



I 



94 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



do something that seems good, even their righteousness 
is as filthy rags. 

All things which God made work well except 
human nature ; and that worked so badly that it fell 
as soon as it was put together. God must start anew, 
and so he destroys all, except eight persons. But, so 
bad is human nature, the new family behave no better ; 
they must be cast aside ; and God discards all except- 
ing the posterity of a single man. But they turn out 
as bad as the rest, and must be thrown over. No good 
comes of human reason, and human nature ; so at 
length " a New Dispensation " is established. But the 
new dispensation has worked scarcely better than the 
others. The human race does not turn out as God de- 
signed, or expected. It is a failure. 

This is taught in every great scheme of theology, 
Protestant or Catholic. 

Note next the doctrine of the Relation between God 
and Man. God is the sovereign lord, the king of the 
human race, and is represented as creating and ruling 
the world not for the world's good, but for his own good 
or glory. Jesus calls God " the Father," — the favor- 
ite name with that great noble heart, — and does not 
call Him King. In the third Gospel God is the Father 
who sees his penitent prodigal son a great way off, and 
goes out to meet him, and falls on his neck and kisses 
him, and rejoices more over one sinner brought to re- 
pentance than over ninety and nine just men. The au- 
thor of the Epistle ascribed to John, says — " God is 
Love." It is the bravest word in the whole Bible. But 
by the popular theology God is King ; Catholics and 
Protestants represent Him as a despotic king. There 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



95 



are three elements, as I just said, conspicuous in his 
character. The first is Power, — force of hand, force 
of head ; next, Selfishness, — love of his own glory ; 
and third, Destructiveness. Like other kings He cares 
little for the welfare of his creatures, though He pre- 
tends to care much. Men must fear this king ; this is 
the highest thing you can do. You must pray to God 
only by attorney. Your prayer will make Him alter 
his mind and change his purpose, if you employ the 
right attorney in the right way ; for though this king is 
said to be unchangeable, it is thought He will be 
moved by the poor petitions you and I put up. Divines 
talk of " constraining prayer," — a prayer that will con- 
strain God to alter his will ! The classic mythology 
represents the ' ancient Heathen gods as selfish in their 
ruling propensity ; and the popular theology represents 
God as selfish in his love of power and of glory, and 
terribly selfish in his wrath. Accordingly, such actions 
are ascribed to the Deity, in the popular theology, as in 
almost any country of Christendom would send a man 
to the gallows. The God of the popular theology is the 
exploiterer of the human race. 

In this theology God is represented as having made 
and finished a miraculous communication of his will 
to a small portion of mankind, — the Jews and Chris- 
tians : that is the " law of God " written in the Bible ; 
the Old Testament is his first word, and the New Tes- 
tament is his last word. But in fact the two are in 
many fundamental teachings exactly opposite ; yet men 
are told to believe them exactly alike. A man must 
believe every word in the Old and New Testament, and 
keep every command there. Does his reason stand in 
the way ? — " down with reason ! " does his conscience, 
his affection, or his soul stand in the way ? — " down 



96 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



with them all ! " cries the popular theology, " down 
with human nature ! " The universe is not thought to 
be the word of God at all, that is " Nature ; " and here 
again the old heathen notion of a discord betwixt God 
and the world comes up anew. The laws written in 
this marvellous body ; the laws of the understanding, 
the conscience, the affections, the soul, — they are 
not thought to be the word of God ; they are not im- 
perative, ultimately binding on men. We are to obey 
only an arbitrary and capricious command. 

But man has not kept this command. Men could 
not keep it ; God knew they could not and would not 
keep it when He made them. Of course He wished to 
make such a law and such men as are thus unfit for 
one another — Nature unlawful, and law unnatural 
And when men do not keep the law that He told them 
to keep, and which he had made it impossible for them 
to keep, straightway He is angry with them, and hates 
them, and will destroy them in wrath. So He makes 
the earth bring forth thorns and thistles for the first 
offenders, and provides eternal torments for the erring 
sons of men. 

This theology declares, Every sin is an infinite evil, 
because it is a violation of the absolute command of 
God. In a moment of time you can commit an infinite 
sin, and if you have once transgressed any command- 
ment of God, even in the smallest particular, you are 
guilty of violating the whole law of God, and are under 
the infinite wrath of God ; and all you can do, all you 
can suffer, will not reconcile God to you : He hates you 
with all his power, all his selfishness, all his destructive- 
ness. But if you do not commit any of these sins, at 
least you are born of the first sinner, and accordingly 
were as much hurt by the " fall " as he. But, the the- 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



97 



ology continues, an atonement has been made, a sacri- 
fice for the sin of the world. God the Father eternally 
begot God the Son, and sent him into the world, going 
voluntarily, and had him crucified as a sacrifice for the 
sin of the world. Thus God the Father is appeased 
by the sacrifice of God the Son, who has made atone- 
ment for men and taken all the sins of men upon him- 
self, and so pacified the infinite wrath of God the 
Father. 

But he did this only for such as would comply with 
certain doctrinal and liturgical conditions : that is, they 
must believe certain doctrines which are repugnant to 
the whole nature of a good and cultivated man ; repug- 
nant to his reason, his conscience, his affections, and 
his soul. Then they must do certain sacramental deeds, 
which have no connection with practical life ; nothing 
to do with natural piety and natural morality. The 
belief of these doctrines and the doing of these deeds 
is called "Christianity," or "religion." It is represented 
as wholly unnatural and all the more valuable for that 
reason, for the natural heart is at enmity with God. 
Thus some men are to be "saved;" such as comply 
enjoy eternal happiness, the rest " perish everlastingly." 

The theoretic and principal design of this theology 
is not to make better men, — better fathers, husbands, 
brothers, sons ; better mechanics, merchants, farmers, — * 
only to get them " saved ; " that is, to insure them a 
good time in the next world. Morality and its conse- 
quent welfare on earth is only incidental to the end of 
religion. So religion is positively selfish — not for its 
own sake, but for salvation's sake. 

But very few come to that salvation ; it is only a 
few that are saved, — look at the list of mankind, — - 
only the Christians and a few of the eminent Hebrews 

9 



98 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



before Christ, no Hebrew since ; and of the Christians, 
none but the Elect in the Protestant Church, and in the 
Catholic Church only such as die in its communion. 
Well, to speak approximately, in round numbers, at 
this day there are a thousand million men on the earth. 
Two hundred and fifty millions are "nominal Chris- 
tians." To take the Protestant view, — of these nomi- 
nal Christians perhaps one in forty is what might be 
called a real Christian ; that is an ecclesiastical Chris- 
tian, or actual member of a church with the doctrinal 
and liturgical qualifications just referred to. That 
gives us six and a quarter millions of real ecclesi- 
astical Christians. According to the theology of the 
prevailing Protestant sects, none can be saved unless 
he is of that company. But this number must be 
winnowed down still further; for only the Elect are 
to be saved. What is the ratio of the elect Christians 
to the non-elect ? I do not find it put down in the theo- 
logical arithmetic, and have no means of ascertaining. 
But all the rest are to be damned to everlasting woe ; 
that is, all men now living who are not Christians, name- 
ly, seven hundred and fifty millions ; and of the nomi- 
nal Christians ninety-seven and a half per cent, or two 
hundred and forty-three millions and a quarter more; 
and of the real Christians I know not how many ; and 
of men long ago deceased, all the non-elect of the real 
Christians, all the merely nominal Christians, and all 
who were not nominal Christians ; — so that not more 
than one out of a hundred thousand men could ever 
taste of Heaven. 

The Catholic doctrine on this point condemns all 
who are out of the Catholic Church. The distinction 
sometimes made by tender-hearted and pious Catholics, 
between the Body of the Church which is visible, and 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



99 



the Soul of the Church which is invisible, is only an 
individual departure from the doctrinal tradition of the 
Church itself. 

The first Gospel represents the way to Heaven as 
narrow and strait, and found by few ; and the other, the 
way to Hell, is represented as broad and abundantly 
travelled. Says the Methodist hymn, which incarnates 
in a single verse the teaching of the popular theology, 

" Broad is the road that leads to Death, 
And thousands -walk together there ; 
But AVisdom shows a narrow path, 
"With here and there a traveller." 

Those that are saved are not saved by their character ; 
virtue has no virtue to save your soul. Tell the Cath- 
olic priest you expect Heaven for your good works, and 
your faithfulness to yourself, — he assures you that you 
are in the bond of iniquity. Tell the Protestant priest 
the same thing, he is certain you are in the broad way 
to destruction. You must be saved only by the suffer- 
ings of Christ as the divine cause ; and by belief in this 
theology, as the human condition. Piety and Morality, 
" natural religion/' is no condition of salvation ; good 
works are bad things for that. The elect are no better 
than other men ; they are saved by virtue of the De- 
crees of God, who has mercy on whom He will have 
mercy, and rejects whom he will, and takes his elect 
to heaven by a short path through " grace," not over 
the long, flat, dull road of "works." It is supposed 
that man has no right towards God, and that God's 
mode of operation is infinite caprice. Laws of Nature 
are no finality with their Maker ! 

The Holy Ghost is represented as going about seek- 
ing to inspire men with the will to be saved. He does 



100 



THE POPULAK THEOLOGY. 



not come into assemblies of men of science, who are 
seeking to learn the laws of God. It would be deemed 
impious to speak of the Holy Ghost as attending the 
meetings of the French Institute, or the Academy of 
Arts and Sciences in Boston. He does not come into 
assemblies of men trying to make the world better off, 
and men better. It would be deemed blasphemy to 
speak of the Holy Ghost as attending a meeting for the 
prevention of pauperism or crime ; a peace meeting, a 
temperance meeting, a meeting against capital punish- 
ment, an anti-slavery convention, or a Woman's Rights' 
meeting. If somebody should say of the Convention 
that met at Syracuse, day before yesterday, to com- 
memorate the rescue of a fugitive slave out of the 
hands of the kidnappers, that " the Holy Ghost de- 
scended upon it, " what would the clergymen say ? 
"Why, that would be thought a greater atrocity than 
even I have ever yet committed. The Holy Ghost is 
not represented as inspiring philosophers like Leibnitz, 
Newton, and Kant, or philanthropists like the reformers 
of old or modern times. He attends camp-meetings, is 
present at " Revivals," frequents tract societies, and the 
like. You never saw a picture of the Holy Ghost 
coming down upon a chemist inventing ether, on Co- 
lumbus thinking America into life, or on Faustus 
making a printing-press — it is the Devil that is said to 
have inspired him, and by no means the Holy Ghost. 
Oh no, the Holy Ghost is not represented as descending 
on Franklin, flying a kite into a thundercloud and 
taking out the lightning with a string, founding acad- 
emies, and hospitals, and libraries ; but he comes down 
upon monks, and nuns, and ascetics, praying with their 
lips ; not on common laborious men and women pray- 
ing with their hands. It would be thought impious, to 



THE POPULAK THEOLOGY. 



101 



paint the " gentle spirit " coming down on a New Eng- 
land school-house, where an intelligent young woman 
was teaching children the way they should go ; or to 
paint the " Heavenly Dove " fluttering over the head of 
John Pounds, the British shoemaker, sitting in his nar- 
row shop amid paste-horns and swine's bristles, and 
bits of leather, 

" His lapstone over his knee, 
Drawing his quarters and sole together," 

whilst teaching the little boys and girls to read and 
write after he had picked them out of the streets. The 
Holy Ghost of theology has nothing to do with such 
things at all ; nothing to do with schemes for making 
the world better, or men better. 

Then it is represented that God once inspired men, 
Hebrews and Christians. Now he inspires no man as 
of old ; he only sends you to a book and the meeting- 
house. It is thought God inspires nobody now. He 
has spoken his last word, and made his last will and 
testament. There can be no progress in Christianity, 
none out of it. We have got all the religious truth 
God will ever give us. The fount of inspiration is 
clean dried up, and God is so far off that the human 
soul may wander all its mortal life and never come near 
him. All it gets must be at second-hand. 

Such, my friends, is the popular theology as a Theory 
of the Universe, This is the theology which lies at the 
basis of all the prevailing sects. I have taken pains not 
to quote the language of particular sects or particular 
persons. Let no one be answerable for the common 
vice. The Universalists have departed widely from 

9* 



102 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



this theology in the doctrine of damnation ; the Unita- 
rians have departed less widely in the doctrine of the 
threefold personality of God. But with the mass of 
theologians God is still represented as finite and malig- 
nant; man the veriest wretch in creation, with a de- 
praved nature; the relation between him and God is 
represented as a selfish rule on God's part, and a slavish 
fear on man's part; — one man is saved out of a hun- 
dred thousand, and ninety-nine thousand nine hundred 
and ninety-nine are damned to eternal ruin. God 
exploiters the human race. Man is a worm, and God 
is represented as a mighty heel to crush him down to 
hell, not to death but to writhings without end. 

This being so, see how the world looks from this 
theological point of view. 

God is not represented as a friend, but the worst foe 
to men; existence is a curse to all but one out of a 
hundred thousand ; immortality is a curse to ninety- 
nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine out of 
every hundred thousand on earth ; religion a blessing to 
only ten in a million, to all the rest a torment on earth, 
and in hell, the bitterest part of the bitter fire which 
burns everlastingly the immortal flesh and quivering 
soul. 

Is this popular theology a satisfactory Theory of the 
Universe ? Does it correspond to the facts of material 
Nature, under all men's eyes ; the facts of human his- 
tory, the facts of daily observation ? Does this idea of 
God, of Man, and of then Relation — of God's prov- 
idence and man's destination — does this agree with 
the natural sentiments of reverence and trust which 
spring unbidden in the living heart ; with the sponta- 
neous intuitions of the True, the Beautiful, the Good, 
the Holy ; with the results of the highest reflective con- 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



103 



sciousness ? No, it is a theory which does not corre- 
spond with facts of material Nature and human history, 
facts of daily observation ; it does not agree with nat- 
ural sentiments, spontaneous intuitions, or with volun- 
tary reflection ! It is a theory without facts, without 
reason, a theory whose facts are Fancies, and its reason 
Caprice. It swings in the air at both ends. So it bids 
us ignore the facts of the outer universe and deny the 
powers of the inner world ; then where it has made a 
solitude it proclaims a peace, and calls it the Peace of 
God. 

The other Sunday I spoke of Speculative Atheism 
as a Theory of the Universe. I hope I did no injustice 
to atheism, or the atheist. But which is the worst, to 
believe that there is no God who is Mind, Cause, and 
Providence of this universe, that all comes by a fortu- 
itous concurrence of atoms, the world a chance-shot ; or 
to believe there is a God who is Almighty, yet omnipo- 
tently malignant, who consciously aims the forces of 
the universe at the wretched head of his own child ? 
Which is the worst, to believe that I die wholly, abso- 
lutely, irrecoverably, and go down to be a brother to 
the worm of the dust, or to believe that, immortal, I go 
to curl and stretch and writhe in tortures forever and 
ever ? Which is the hardest, to believe that your only 
child, which fades out of your bosom before the rose- 
bud is fully blown, is no more in all the earth, in all the 
sky, in all the universe, or that she goes to torment un- 
speakable, unmitigable, which can have no end when 
the universe of worlds shall have passed away, and left 
no wrinkle on the sky that has also grown old and 
passed out of being ? Which, I ask, is the worst, to 
believe that there is no ear to hear Abel's blood crying 



104 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



against Cain, or to believe that there is an ear which 
hears it, One who will damn Cain and millions on mill- 
ions of men, guilty of no sin but birth — the act of 
God ; — will damn all these forever and ever, and then 
will look down with the Eye which never slumbers nor 
sleeps, and see the innumerable millions of men, 
women, and babes, all He there a mass quivering with 
torment, which He had inflicted of his own freewill, 
and made them for the sake of inflicting it, while Him- 
self feels not a twdnge of pity, nor lets fall a single tear- 
drop of love, but rolls all the universe of hell as a sweet 
morsel under his tongue ! Which I say, is the worst — 
to declare with the atheist " There is no God, all possi- 
ble ideas thereof lack actuality," or to paint the Cause, 
the Mind, and Providence of all this world as a hideous 
Devil — and the universe itself an odious and inexo- 
rable hell ? 

Yet the atheist, I suppose, has been faithful to him- 
self; and the men who have taught these horrid and 
odious doctrines, I cannot say they have not been faith- 
ful. But I must say that as I hate atheism, so I hate 
this other doctrine, which represents religion as a tor- 
ment, immortality a curse, and God a fiend. 

Atheism, as I said the other Sunday, sits down on 
the shore of Time, and sees the stream of Humanity 
pass by. All the civilizations which have enfolded so 
many millions of men in their arms, seem but frail and 
brittle bubbles, passing into nought, — virtues unre- 
quited, tears not wiped away, sufferings unrecompensed, 
and man without hope. 

Look again. The Popular Theology sits down on 
the same spot by the shore of Time, and the great river 
of Human History sweeps by, fed by a thousand differ- 
ent streams, all mingling their murmurs into one great 



THE POPTJLAK THEOLOGY, 



105 



oceanic harmony of sounds, as it rolls on through Time, 
passing to Eternity. I go up before Theology and ask, 
" what is this ? " " It is the stream of Human History." 
" Whence does it come ? " " It flows from God." 
« Where is He ? " « There is God ! Clouds and thick 
darkness are about Him. He is a consuming fire, a 
jealous God, and the breath of his nostrils and the 
wrath of his heart are poured out against mankind. 
In His hand is a twoedged sword, and out from His 
mouth there goes forth fire to wither and destroy." 
" Where does this stream end ? " ask I. " Look ! " is 
the answer ; " there is the mouth and terminus of this 
great stream." On the right Theology points to Jesus, 
standing there with benignant face, — yet not all benig- 
nant, but cruel also ; Theology paints the friend of pub- 
licans and sinners with malicious pencil, making to the 
right a little, thin, narrow outlet, which is to admit a 
mere scantling of the water into a shallow pool, where 
it shall gleam forever. But on the other hand a whole 
Amazon pours down to perdition the drainage of a 
continent, into the bottomless pit, which Hell is moved 
to meet at its coming, and a mighty devil — the vulture 
of God's wrath, tormentor and tormented, — sailing on 
horrid vans, hovers above the whole. And there is the 
end ! No, — not the end, there is the beginning of the 
eternal torments of the vast mass of the human family 
- — acquaintance and friend, kith and kin, lover and 
maid, husband and wife, parent and child. 

Which — Atheism or Theology — gives us the fairest 
picture ? Atheism, even annihilation of the soul, would 
be a relief from such a Deity as that ; from such an 
end. 

I said the other day there were atheists in America 
seeking to spread their notions. But for one who 



106 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



denies a deity there are a hundred ministers who preach 
this other doctrine of a jealous and an angry God ; 
the exploiterer of the race, who will drive down ^he 
majority of men to perdition, and go on his way rejoic- 
ing ! The few atheists will do harm with their theory 
of the universe ; but not a hundredth part of the harm 
which must be done by this view of God, and Man, 
and the Relation between the two. Atheism is taught 
in the name of philosophy, in the name of Man ; this 
theology is taught in the name of religion, in the name 
of God. I said I should throw no stones at atheists ; 
that I felt pity for them. I shall throw none at theolo- 
gians, who teach that religion is a torment, immortality 
a curse, and God a devil. I pity them ; they did not 
mean to go astray. Mankind is honest. Most of the 
men who teach the dreadful doctrines of atheism, and 
of the popular theology are alike honest. Lucretius 
and Augustine, d'Holbach and Calvin, I think, were all 
sincere men, and honest men — and perhaps equally 
went astray. 

Do men really believe these doctrines which they 
teach ? The fool hath said in his heart, " There is no 
God!" and I can believe the fool thinks so when he 
says it. Yes, if the fool should say what the theologian 
has said, — " God is a devil, Man is a worm, hell is his 
everlasting home ; immortality the greatest curse to all 
but ten men in a million," I should believe the fool 
thought it. But does any sober man really believe all 
this of God, and Man, and the Relation between them ? 
He may say so, but I see not how any man can really 
believe it, and have a realizing sense of this theology, 
and still live. Even the men who wrote this odious 
doctrine, — the Basils and Gregories and Augustines of 
old time, the Edwardses and Hopkinses of the last gen- 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



107 



eration, and the Emmonses of this day, — they did not 
believe it, they could not believe it. The atheist thinks 
that he thinks there is no God, and theologians think 
that they think religion is a torment, immortality a 
curse, and God a devil. But, God be thanked, Nature 
cries out against this odious doctrine, that man is a 
worm, that religion is a torment, immortality a curse, 
and God a fiend. 



From behind this dark and thunderino: cloud of the 
popular theology, how beautifully comes forth the calm, 
clear light of natural human religion, revealing to us 
God as the Infinite Father, as the Infinite Mother of 
all, perfectly powerful, perfectly wise, perfectly just and 
loving, and perfectly holy too ! Then how beautiful is 
the Universe ! It is the great Bible of God ; — Mate- 
rial Nature is the Old Testament, millions of years old, 
spangled with truths under our feet, sparkling with 
glories over our head; and Human Nature, is the New 
Testament from the Infinite God, every day revealing a 
new page as Time turns over the leaf. Immortality 
stands waiting to give a recompense for every virtue 
not rewarded, for every tear not wiped away, for every 
sorrow unrecompensed, for every prayer, for each pure 
intention of the heart. And over the whole, — Old 
Testament and New Testament, Mortality and Im- 
mortality, — the Infinite Loving- Kindness of God the 
Father, comes brooding down as a bird over her nest ; 
aye, taking us to His own infinite arms and blessing us 
with Himself. 

Look up at the stars, study the mathematics of the 
heavens writ in those gorgeous diagrams of fire, where 
all is law, order, harmony, beauty without end ; look 



108 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



down on the ant-hill in the fields some morning in early 
summer, and study the ethics of the emmets, all law, 
order, harmony, beauty without end ; look round on the 
cattle, on the birds, on the cold fishes in the stream, the 
reptiles, insects, and see the mathematics of their struc- 
ture, and the ethics of their lives ; do you find any sign 
that the First Person of the Godhead is malignant and 
capricious, and the Fourth Person thereof is a devil; 
that Hate preponderates in the world ? Look back over 
the whole course of human history ; you see war and 
violence it is true, but the higher powers of man gain- 
ing continually on the animal appetites at every step, 
the race getting fairer, wiser, juster, more affectionate, 
more faithful unto justice, love, and all their laws ; look 
in you, and study the instinctive emotions of your own 
nature, and in some high hour of self-excitement when 
you are most yourself, ask if there can be such a horrid 
God as the popular theology so blackly paints, making 
his human world from such a selfish motive, of such a 
base material, and for such a purpose, — to rot its fiery 
immortality in hell ? 

Is this dreadful theology to continue ? The days of 
its foul doctrines are numbered. The natural instincts 
of man are against it; the facts of history are against it; 
every advance of science makes this theology appear 
the more ghastly and odious. It is in a process of dis- 
solution and must die. The popular theology, 

" Mouldering with the dull earth's mouldering sod, 
Inwrapt tenfold in slothful shame, 
Lies there exiled from eternal God, 

Lost to her place and name ; 
And death and life she hateth equally, 
And nothing sees for her despair, 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



109 



But dreadful Time, dreadful Eternity. 

No comfort anywhere ; 
Remaining utterly confused with fears, 

And ever worse with growing time, 
And ever unrelieved by dismal tears, 

And all alone in crime 
Shut up as in a crumbling tomb, girt round 

With blackness as a solid wall, 
Far off she seems to hear the dully sound 

Of human footsteps fall ; 
As in strange lands a traveller walking slow, 

In doubt and great perplexity, 
A little before moon-rise hears the low 

Moan of an unknown sea, 
And knows not if it be thunder, or a sound 

Of stones thrown down, or one deep cry 
Of great wild beasts ; then thinketh, ' I have found 

A new land, but I die ! ' " 



10 



SERMON IV. 

OF THE POPULAR THEOLOGY AS ETHICS. 

(ill j 



MATTHEW VII. 19. 

A CORRUPT TREE BRIXGETH FORTH EVIL FRUIT. 

(112) 



IV. 



OF THE POPULAR THEOLOGY OF CHRISTENDOM, 
REGARDED AS A PPJNCTPLE OF ETHICS. 



Last Sunday I spoke of the popular Christian The- 
ology, as a Theory of the Universe. To-day I ask 
your attention to a sermon of this Theology, regarded 
as a Principle of Ethics ; that is to say, of the practical 
effects thereof when the Idea shall become a Fact. 
I am not now to speak of the practical effects of 
the Christian Religion ; that is to say, of Piety and 
Morality : I am to speak of something very different ; 
namely, of the Popular Theology, with its false idea 
of God, its false idea of Man, and its false idea of the 
relation between the two. 

I shall not speak of this theology, with these three 
false ideas, as a fraud, but as a mistake. The worst 
doctrines thereof, which make man a worm, religion a 
curse, immortality a torment, and God a devil, I take it, 
once represented the honest thought of honest men, or 
what they thought was their thought. John Calvin was 
an honest man ; Augustine and St. Thomas were hon- 
est men ; Edwards and Hopkins and Emmons, — they 
were all honest men. The greatest may easily be mis- 

10* ( 113 ) 



114 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



taken, especially if they throw away their reason when 
they start. The Hebrew theology, the Greek and 
Roman theology, the Mahometan theology, — all these 
are the productions of honest men, who meant to be 
right and not wrong. So the errors of alchemy, in the 
Middle Ages, of astrology, — they also were the mis- 
takes of honest men. 

This theology — very much miscalled Christian — 
has been made a practical principle of Christendom for 
many hundred years. It is set up as Religion ; for 
though religion and theology are as different from one 
another as breathing is different from the theory of 
breath, or as slumber is different from the philosophy 
of sleep, yet it is taught that this theology is religion, is 
Christianity, and that without this there can be no ade- 
quate piety and morality, no sufficient belief in God, 
and no happiness in the next life. This theology de- 
clares, " There is no stopping betwixt me and blank 
atheism." 

Since religion is represented as thus unnatural and 
unreasonable, there are many who " sign off" from con- 
scious religion altogether : they reject it, and will have 
nothing to do with it. It seems to war with their rea- 
son, with their conscience, their affections, their soul ; 
and so far as possible, they reject it. They mean to be 
true to their noblest faculties in doing so. The popular 
theology, with its idea of God and Man, and of their 
Relation, is the philosophy of unreason, of folly. How 
can you ask men of large reason, large conscience, large 
affections, large love for the good God, to believe any 
one of the numerous schemes of the Trinity, the Mira- 
cles of the New or Old Testament ; to believe in the 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



115 



existence of a Devil whom God has made, seeking to 
devour mankind ? How can you ask such men to be- 
lieve in the existence of an angry God, jealous, capri- 
cious, selfish, and revengeful, who has made an im- 
measurable hell under his feet, wherein he designs to 
crowd down ninety-nine thousand nine hundred and 
ninety-nine out of every hundred thousand of his chil- 
dren? Will you ask Humbolt, the greatest of living 
philosophers, to believe that a wafer is " the body of 
God," as the Catholics say? or Mr. Comte, to believe 
that the Bible is " the word of God," as the Protestants 
say? Will you ask a man of great genius, of great 
culture, to lay his whole nature in the dust, and submit 
to some little man, with no genius, who only reads to 
him a catechism which was dreamed by some celi- 
bate monks in the dark ages of human history ? You 
cannot expect such men to assent to that : as well 
might you ask the whole solar system to revolve 
about the smallest satellite that belongs to the planet 
Saturn. 

A methodist minister explained the success of his 
sect by saying, " We preach religion without philoso- 
phy." That is to say, religion without reason ; resting 
on the authority of the priest who preaches it. An 
eminent Unitarian minister says, " We also must preach 
religion without philosophy." That is, religion without 
reason, resting on the authority of the minister. What 
is the effect of it? Men who have philosophy, who 
have reason, will shun your Unitarian and Methodist 
churches, and keep to their reason and philosophy ; and 
they will have as little of such " religion " as possible. 
Will you ask a philanthropic woman to believe that 
" God hates sinners," and will abandon his own chil- 



116 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



dren to the eternal torments of the devil, when the phi- 
lanthropist would not leave the devil's children to their 
infernal father's care, but lay down her own life to save 
them ? Shall mortal men believe in a God meaner and 
less humane than they themselves ? 

See the effect of this theology. The new literature 
of our time, the new science of our time, the new phi- 
lanthropy of our time, have no relation to the popular 
theology, except that of hate and of warfare. There is 
a very sad negation and denial of religion in the popu- 
lar literature. Religion is seldom appealed to in the 
Houses of Parliament, in Old England or New Eng- 
land. It does not appear as a conscious motive force 
in any of the great actions of the age, in the great phi- 
lanthropies, the great philosophies and literatures, in the 
great commerce. In the most popular writers of Eng- 
land, France, Germany, religion does not appear at 
all as an acknowledged motive. The ideal Brothers 
Cheeryble of Mr. Dickens, the actual philanthropists 
of Europe and America, are God's men, but not the 
Church's Christians. All the real piety which appears 
in the works and words of Jesus of Nazareth, all the 
real philanthropy, is bottomed on something exceed- 
ingly different from the popular theology. 

The immortality of the soul is represented as a curse ; 
and, accordingly, that immortality is denied by many 
philosophical and good men. From the damnation of 
theological immortality they flee away for relief to 
sheer annihilation ; — and it is a good exchange which 
they make ; for if the popular theology were true, then 
immortality would be the greatest curse which the Al- 
mighty God could inflict on mankind ; and the whole 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



117 



human race ought to go up in a mass before the Fa- 
ther, and say, " Annihilate us all at once, and make an 
end of your slow, everlasting, butchery of human souls ! " 

There is but one denomination of hell, and in respect 
to this there is no difference between the Catholics and 
the Protestants — only one quite modern sect of the 
latter formally and utterly rejecting it. With that ex- 
ception the modern Christian Church is unitary on the 
ghastly doctrine of eternal damnation, and it makes 
small odds whether I quote from Aquinas, Quenstedt, 
or Edwards. It is a favorite doctrine with the Catholic 
and Protestant clergy. 

According to the popular theology the Elect are very 
well satisfied with hell as the portion for their neighbors. 
Listen to Jonathan Edwards, who is commonly reck- 
oned one of the ablest intellectual men New England 
ever bore in her bosom ; a self-denying and good man, 
a man who would have laid down his life for his 
brother, if his brother had needed the sacrifice. Hear 
what he says, following Calvin, Aquinas, and Augus- 
tine : " The destruction of the unfruitful " (and the 
unfruitful are those not elected to eternal bliss) " is 
of use to give the saints a greater sense of their own 
happiness and of God's grace to them." The damned 
" shall be tormented in the presence of the holy angels, 
and in the presence of the Lamb. So they will be tor- 
mented in the presence also of the glorified saints. Here- 
by the saints will be made the more sensible how great 
their salvation is. When they shall see how great the 
misery is from which God hath saved them, and how 
great a difference He hath made between their state and 
the state of others, who were by nature and perhaps for 
a time by practice, no more sinful and ill-deserving than 
any, it will give them a greater sense of the wonder- 



118 



THE POPULAK THEOLOGY. 



fulness of God's grace to them. Every time they look 
upon the damned it will excite in them a lively and 
admiring sense of the grace of God in making them 
so to differ." " The view of the misery of the damned 
will double the ardor of the love and gratitude of the 
saints in Heaven;" "will make them prize his favor 
and love vastly the more, and they will be so much the 
more happy in the enjoyment of it." 

A good man on earth cannot eat his dinner, if a 
hungry dog looks in his face, without giving him a 
bone, surely the crumbs that fall from his table ; but the 
elect of Mr. Edwards, chosen out of God's Universe, are 
to whet their appetite with the groans of the damned. 
What shall we think of the Ethics which makes a 
Christian Minister anticipate new joy in heaven from 
looking down upon the torment of his former neighbors 
and friends, nay, of his own children, — and whetting 
his appetite for Heaven with the smoke of their tor- 
ment steaming up from hell ! But such is the doc- 
trine of the popular theology of New England and of 
Old England, and all Christendom. The idea is suffi- 
ciently scriptural, and has long been claimed as a " doc- 
trine of revelation." Everybody who denies it from 
Adamantine Origen of Alexandria to Hosea Ballou in 
Boston, gets a bad name in the churches. The idea 
of eternal damnation is the Goliath of the Church. 
Now I say annihilation is a relief from that form of 
" everlasting life ; " and that is the cause why many 
men deny the immortality of the soul. 

Then God is represented as a tyrant ; an omnipotence 
of selfishness, with a mode of action which is wholly 
inconsistent with the facts of Nature and the laws 
of the human mind. Of all the grim conceptions of 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



119 



Deity which men have ever formed, from Tyrian Mel- 
karth to Scandinavian Loke, I know none more grim 
and abominable than the conception of God set forth by 
some of the ablest writers of the Catholic and Protes- 
tant Church. It revolts the dearest instincts of human 
nature. 

Accordingly some men deny the existence of God. 
They not only deny the actuality of the popular theo- 
logical idea of God, but of all possible ideas of God. 
There is much excuse for the speculative atheist in his 
denial. 

The popular theological idea of God is not adequate 
to the purposes of science. God is not represented as 
really omnipresent, a constant and perpetual power, 
but as present eminently in one spot called Heaven. 
A modern Doctor of Divinity declares in an address, 
well studied, and delivered before scholarly men, that 
we are not to suppose that God is in all places as he 
is in some one special place. Accordingly his action is 
to be regarded as irregular and spasmodic. This doc- 
trine, though seldom plainly put, though often denied in 
terms, lies deep in the popular theology — which knows 
no God immanent in the Universe and yet transcen- 
dent thereof. It is the Bible doctrine, Catholic and 
Protestant. 

Science knows no limited and local God; it tells us 
of a power immanent and uniform ; 

" As full as perfect in a hair as heart." 

So then Science rejects the theological idea of God 
as not being adequate for scientific purposes. 

Then as Theology tells you of a God who loves one 
and rejects nine hundred and ninety-nine out of the 



120 



THE POPULAK THEOLOGY. 



thousand, modern Philanthropy rejects that idea of 
God, as inadequate to its purpose. Science rejects it 
because he is impotent ; Philanthropy rejects it because 
he is malignant. 

The popular idea of God does lack actuality. It is 
a conceivable nothing; but impossible, and involving 
as much contradiction as the notion of a cubical sphere, 
or of a thing which is and is not at the same time. 
The atheist is right in denying the existence of an 
angry and jealous God, who makes ninety-nine thou- 
sand nine hundred and ninety-nine for ruin, and only 
one for bliss. The " atheism " of Comte and Feuer- 
bach, is higher and better than the theological idea of 
God, as represented by Jonathan Edwards, the great 
champion of New England divinity. But Edwards 
only painted full length, and in colors, what Augustine 
and Aquinas and other great theological artists had 
faintly sketched, with paler tints, shrinking back a little 
from the gorgon head they dimly drew. 

Now as this theology gives us such an unjust and 
unnatural idea of God, of Man, and of the Relation 
between the two, there has followed, as an unavoidable 
consequence of this, a great denial of religion all over 
Christendom ; a denial of the religious nature of man, 
of the immortality of the soul, and of the existence of 
God. The great priests are technical Christians every- 
where ; the great philosophers and the great philanthro- 
pists are not technical Christians anywhere. I mean to 
say the Church does not recognize them as belonging 
to its bosom ; — and they do not belong to the Church's 
bosom. What is more — the sincerity of the great 
priests in their professions of theological belief, is pop- 
ularly doubted just in proportion to the intellect and 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



121 



education of the priest ; while nobody doubts that the 
denial of the philosopher is sincere and honest. Out 
of the priesthood the great minds reject the popular 
theology ; many of them I fear reject all theology. Of 
all the greatest minds of the Germanic race, Humboldt, 
Von-Buch, Oken, Oersted, Vogt, not one of them is 
technically a Christian. The great Germanic minds 
not long ago deceased — Kant, Fichte, Hegel, Gothe, 
Schiller, and the rest were any thing but " professing 
Christians ; " not one of them could accept the theology 
of the Church which baptized him. The leaders of the 
new French literature, — Comte, the Communists, and 
George Sand, and several popular writers — they are 
atheistic : I mean speculatively atheistic. I fear that 
the leaders of English literature are not at all better, 
only in the English there is a greater amount of na- 
tional reserve ; they do not speak right out, as the 
French or Germans. The later works of the greatest 
mind of England at this day, have no religiousness in 
them, according to the common sense of the word, and 
he has been led even to go far towards absolute denial 
of all religion. 

In England there is a social aristocracy composed of 
rich or well-descended men, well instructed also in their 
intellect; they seem almost entirely destitute of con- 
scious religion ; they have no theology which satisfies 
their intellectual and religious need. Some of them 
turn round, and follow the dim candle of tradition lead- 
ing them back to mediaeval, or even ante- Christian 
darkness. Some positively deny the truths of religion, 
which come to consciousness in every age, — mediaeval 
or ante- Christian. The most hopeful it is who feel their 
way along by the natural instincts of the soul — feel- 

11 



122 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



ing after God if haply they may find him who lives and 
moves and has his being in them, as they theirs in him. 
Near the other extreme of society there is a large body 
of hardy, able, thinking men who treat the popular 
theology with well-deserved scoff and scorn ; but yet 
they see no clear light. 

On the Eastern Continent, in addition to those 
classes there is another, — the army of learned men, 
whose doubts are yet deeper than the English, and 
their denial less compromising and more public. Since 
the breaking up of Paganism in Europe, there has never 
been such a period of distrust, of anarchy, and of chaos 
in religion. 

Is it any better in America? Here the ablest men 
are so busy in the race for money or for rank, men are 
so uniformly " up for California," or " up for office," 
that there seems to be little thought in that quarter 
directed to theological or religious matters. Among 
these men compliance with popular opinion and popu- 
lar forms, I suppose often means the same in America 
in our time, as in Rome in the days of Cicero. 

Newton and Leibnitz two hundred years ago were 
the tallest heads in Europe ; they were the leaders also 
in the theology of Europe, and a strong consciousness 
of God pervades all the writings of those mighty men. 
But the minds that at this day take the place of the 
Newtons and Leibnitzes of the last age, are silent on 
the matter, or else mock it to scorn. I do not know a 
single great philosopher in all Christendom who is, in 
the technical sense of the churches, a " Christian," or 
who would wish to be. Of course these men have the 
elements of religion, — love of justice, love of truth, 
love of men, and of faithfulness to their own souls ; but 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



123 



they do not often make it shape these elements into 
conscious religion, and seem to have little conscious 
trust in God. 

This theology has led to a great amount of real re- 
jection of religion by men who wish to be faithful to 
their nature in all its parts. It is of no use to say they 
are bad men. They are not bad men : they lead the 
science, and philanthropies of the world ; and I am 
afraid that the average speculative " atheist," as he calls 
himself, is at this day better than the average specula- 
tive " Christians," as they call themselves. The atheist 
has abandoned religion because it is painted in such 
a form that it seems worse than atheism. The Church 
taught him his denial, and it ought to baptize him, 
and not blaspheme him. I think Calvin and Edwards 
have driven more men from religion than all the specu- 
lative " atheists " have ever done from Pomponatius to 
Feuerbach. 

Then there are bad men who reject religion, reject it 
in their badness. The popular theology is no terror to 
the wicked man. The corrupt politician of England, 
America, Germany, France, the extortioner, the kid- 
napper, — they pretend to accept this theology, they 
"join the Church," bring the minister over to their side, 
and do not fear a single fagot in the great hell of the- 
ology. They may laugh at the theological devil, they 
can beat him at his own weapons. The baron of the 
Middle Ages living for the flesh, and against the better 
instincts of his soul, kept clear of the Church till death 
knocked at his door, then all at once compounded for 
sin, appeased the clergy, and paid off the old score. 
The modern freebooters pay as they go. It is the 
cheaper way. What does the American slave-holder 
care for the devil, for hell, or for the God of Christian 



124 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



theology ? He gets ministers enough to baptize slave- 
holding, and prove it is " only the application of the 
golden rule to life." " Christianity " is not a terror to 
evil doers, but it is a terror to good doers ; for at least 
the American churches launch their feeble thunders in 
the defence of every popular wickedness. 

Now see the effect of this theology on such as ac- 
cept it. 

Note first its effect on the Feelings. Religion is 
not thought a welcome thing, a thing that is to be 
loved for its own sake. Men do not love to speak of it ; 
it is a subject almost wholly banished from " good so- 
ciety." It is sad, grim, melancholy ; it is not love, it is 
fear ; almost wholly fear. If you take the theological 
idea of God, you cannot love Him, — I defy anybody 
to love Jonathan Edwards's or John Calvin's concep- 
tion of the Deity : you can only fear him as the great 
jailor and hangman and tormentor of the universe, the 
divine exploiterer of the race. His world is represented 
as a great inquisition — the torture-chamber holding in 
its hideous embrace all but ten in the million! Ask 
the children brought up in families who believe much in 
this theology, if they ever liked religion : ask the grown 
men. Look in the faces of the severe sects who take 
this theology to heart, and what sad, joyless faces they 
are. Read the publications of the American Tract So- 
ciety, read the New England Primer, the popular books 
treating of religion and circulated in all Catholic coun- 
tries, and you see that this religion is fear, and not joy. 
Men hold their breath when it thunders lest God should 
hear them breathe, and lay at them with his lightning. 
I once heard an eminent Trinitarian minister preach in 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



125 



this city that it was wholly impossible for God to love 
any man except just so far as that man believed all the 
doctrines of the Bible and the New England Primer, 
and kept every commandment in both of these books. 
So, then, there could only be a very few millions of the 
whole world that God cared any thing about. All the 
rest he would damn ; and they would get hell-fire, but 
no pity from angel, God, or devil. No Abraham would 
give Dives a drop of water from his finger's tip. Could 
you love such a God ? I should hate him ; not as I 
should dislike a tyrant like Cesar Borgia, or even as I 
should loathe a New England kidnapper, but as I 
should hate a devil. 

God is represented as selfish and only selfish, and 
selfish continually. He has the power to bless men, 
and prefers to curse them. Religion is represented as 
selfishness, only carried out to all eternity, — and such 
selfishness, too, as none but pirates and kidnappers ever 
practise on earth. " Aha," say the blessed Catholics of 
Aquinas, " Aha," say the elect Puritans of Edwards, as 
they look on the torture of their brethren, " Let God be 
praised for the torment of the wicked; so religion 
bids ! " 

This crow of fear flies round all the churches of Chris- 
tendom. Men tremble at death ; they are afraid of 
hell. Read the Dies Irae of the Catholic Church, the 
" Judgment Hymns " of the Protestants, or still worse 
hear them sung by some full-voiced choir to appropriate 
music, and you understand what lies at the bottom of 
the ecclesiastical service. Attend a funeral in one of 
the stricter sects, — the funeral of the best man you can 
find, but one who was not a " church-member ; " — and 
how cheerless, how hopeless, how comfortless ! You 

11* 



126 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



would think that the door which led to the street where 
the last and loved remains of the friend, husband, father, 
were to be borne out, opened into the bottomless pit. 
Men talk of death, and say it is a dreadful thing to 
come into the presence of the Living God ! Are we 
not always in Thy presence, O Living Father? Are 
not these flowers thy gift ? and when I also blossom out 
of the body, and the husks of the flesh drop away, is it 
a dreadful thing to come into thy presence, O Living 
God ; to be taken to the arms of the Mother who 
bore me ? 

I once knew a boy of early development in religion, 
dry-nursed at school, against his father's command, on 
the New England Primer, and he was filled with ghastly 
fear of the God represented in that Primer, and the hell 
thereof, and the devil therein, and he used to sob him- 
self to sleep with the prayer, " O God ! I beg that I 
may not be damned ! " until at last, before eight years 
old, driven to desperation by that fear, he made way 
with that Primer, and with its grim God, and Hell, and 
Devil, and found rest for his soul in the spontaneous 
teachings of the religious sentiment which sprung up in 
his heart. There are many who have been tortured by 
it all their lives long, and who have not sobbed them- 
selves to sleep after fourscore years of torment. 

You may divide the feelings into two classes : one 
that seeks a finite object, — father, mother, child, brother, 
sister, aunt, friend; the other which seeks the infinite 
Object, the Father and Mother of all. This theology 
is poison and blight and mildew to both of these classes 
of feelings. It makes the trembling mother afraid that 
she shall love her child too well ; so the desire of the 
finite object is balked of its satisfaction. She cannot 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



127 



love the God painted to her in the dark theology of our 
day — and so the infinite hunger of the soul is yet un- 
stilled. 

Note its effect on the Intellect. It debases the mind. 
Quoth Protestant theology, " Reason is carnal : you 
must accept the Scriptures as the word of God, the Old 
Testament as His first word, and the New Testament 
as His last word ; therein God has spoken once for all ; 
you can get nothing further from Him. You must pros- 
trate your mind to the Bible ; you must believe it all." 

The Roman Church is the great idol of the Catho- 
lics : it is infallible. The Pope is the Church in little ; 
he is infallible, and is God, so far as doctrine is con- 
cerned. With the Protestants the Bible stands in just 
the same place ; it is God to the Protestant theology, 
to all intents and purposes, so far as doctrine is con- 
cerned. 

This theology stands in the way of physical science. 
Here is the scheme of the Universe which belongs to 
the popular theology : There is an expanse called the 
earth with its hills and valleys, rivers, lakes, and seas ; 
next below it, there are the waters which are under the 
earth ; then above it is the firmament, beneath which 
are the sun, the moon, and the stars, and above it the 
waters which are over the earth ; the sun, moon, and 
stars move round the earth. This rude notion has long 
stood in the way of science ; it wrung from Alphonso 
of Castile the exclamation, " If God had asked my ad- 
vice at the creation, the world would have been more 
simple and better arranged." Galileo must subscribe 
to this scheme of the universe, or be burned at the stake. 
The Jesuits who edited Newton's Principia declare that 
his theory is contrary to theology ■ — and they publish 



128 



THE POPULAK THEOLOGY. 



his mathematical demonstrations of the revolutions of 
the earth only as a " hypothesis," as a theory not a fact. 

The popular theology meets the Geologists at every 
turn, and denies the most obvious phenomena of sense, 
and the strictest conclusions of science. An eminent 
theologian, a professor in the most liberal theological 
school in America once said : " I can believe that God 
created all the geological strata of the Earth, with their 
fossil remains, all at once, just as they are to-day, much 
easier than I can believe the popular theology is mis- 
taken in its account of the creation in six days ! " Ge- 
ology must give way to Genesis ! 

It stands in the way of history. This is the theo- 
logical scheme of human history : About six thousand 
years ago God created one man, and out of one of his 
ribs formed one woman. The human race is descend- 
ed from that pair. About fifteen hundred years later 
He destroyed by a flood all their descendants except a 
single family from which all the men now on earth 
have descended. God chose one family out of all the 
rest, made a bargain with them, revealed himself to 
them, and not to others, and loved them while he hated 
the rest, and protected his chosen by constant miracles, 
giving Abraham a son miraculously born, then miracu- 
lously commanding the father to offer him as a bloody 
sacrifice ; and at last God himself becomes a man, born 
miraculously, and lives a human life on earth, is put to 
death, and thence returns to life and divinity once more. 
Theology sharply opposes every discovery, every fact, 
and every thought which is at variance with these as- 
sumptions. It demands belief therein as the condition 
of religion and of acceptance with God. 

See how this theology affects the Conscience. If 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



129 



you wish to know what is right, for the standard of 
ultimate appeal, the theologian sends you to the Bible, 

— full of blessed things, but no master ; it contains the 
opinions of forty or fifty different men, the greater part 
of them living from four to ten hundred years before 
Jesus, and belonging to a people we should now call 
half-civilized. For example, if you ask, Is it right for 
the community to kill a man who has slain one of his 
neighbors, when the community have caught and put 
him in a jail, and can keep him there all his life, shut 
from doing harm ? — the theologian sends you to the 
Bible, and tells you that once, (nobody knows when,) 
somebody, (nobody knows who,) in some place, (nobody 
knows where,) said, " Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by 
man shall his blood be shed ! " — and therefore to the 
end of time you shall hang every murderer. 

You ask, Is it right to catch a dark-colored man, and 
make him your slave for life and pay him nothing for 
his services ? and Theology answers, " Yes, for Abra- 
ham did so, even with white men, and every thing 
that Abraham did of course was right ; " and next, 
" Paul sent back a man who had fled from bondage," 

— only he was not black, but white ; and thirdly, — 
and this is the great argument of all, — " Ham, the 
son of Noah laughed at his father when he was drunk, 
and when Noah rose up from his debauch he cursed 
the son of Ham, saying, ' Cursed be Canaan ! a ser- 
vant of servants shall he be unto his brethren ! ' and 
therefore the whites are right in enslaving the blacks." 
This is the theological argument. 

I ask, Must I obey the law statute of men, when it 
offends my conscience ? " Yes," says Theology, " for 
when Nero was emperor of Rome a poor sailmaker 
said, ' The powers that be are ordained of God,' and 



130 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



4 whosoever resisteth the power resisteth the ordinance 
of God.' " The fact that Paul's noble life was a manly 
resistance to tyrants, and a brave obedience to God, is 
not taken into the account. 

This theology leads men to disregard the natural laws 
of both body and spirit, in order to keep an arbitrary 
command. So it underrates the natural morality and 
natural piety. Men keep the Ten Commandments: 
therein they do well ; but they forget that every faculty 
of the body, every faculty of the spirit — of the mind, 
the conscience, the heart, and the soul, — has also its 
commandments, just as imperative as though they had 
been thundered forth by the voice of the Most High, 
amidst the clouds of Sinai. The popular theology 
denies this. 



See the effect of this theology on Practical Life. 
Religion is largely separated from daily work and daily 
charity. It has a place for itself, the meeting-house ; a 
time for itself, Sunday or the hour of prayer. It is not 
thought that " saving religion " has any thing impor- 
tant to do in the chaisemaker's yard, in the tailor's shop, 
or on the farm of the husbandman, in the counting- 
room of the merchant, or the banking-house of the 
capitalist. Religion consists, first, in belief ; next in 
sacraments, — ritual work, attending meeting by pas- 
sive bodily presence, baptism, prayer in words, and com- 
munion, as it is called, by bread and wine. Religion is 
for eternity ; its function is to get souls " saved," " re- 
deemed ; " — saved from an angry God, redeemed from 
eternal torment; not saved from a mean and selfish 
and wicked life, not saved from this cowardly and boy- 
ish fear of death, — by no means that. 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



131 



A practical philanthropist who picks drunkards out 
of the mire, gets them washed and clothed and restored 
to their right mind, once visited a poor widow in a cold 
winter day. She had no wood to burn, no means 
to get it. A clergyman was trying to console her; 
" Have faith in Christ," said he, " He will help you ! " 
Quoth the practical man, " It is not faith in Christ she 
lacks, she has as much of that as you or I, it is wood 
she stands in need of. Her faith will not save her,- with 
the thermometer at zero. Do you think the Saviour 
will come and tip her up two feet of wood at her door ? 
No such thing! She has got faith, but wants fire- 
wood." The missionary went his way, there was no 
more that he could do, the practical man had the wood 
there in an hour ! 

The Unitarians and Universalists have less of the 
popular theology than the other sects. I have heard 
Orthodox men confess the fact that these heretics were 
the best neighbors, the best friends, the most honest 
business men, eminent in charity, and all good works ; 
and I believe the praise was pretty just : but, they 
said, " they are the worst Christians in the world, and 
all their goodness is good for nothing, except in this 
life, and God does not value their works a straw ; at 
the last day He will pass by every Universalist and 
Unitarian in the world, with all their philanthropy, to 
save some Orthodox deacon who never went out of his 
way to do a kind deed." 

Hence it comes to pass that men who are eminent 
for theological piety are not to be trusted. Their the- 
ology makes them attend to beliefs, rituals, and sacra- 
ments, but there it ends. Mr. Screw has the devoutest 
belief in the popular theology, never fails of a sacra- 
ment, never cherishes a doubt. His morning and even- 



132 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



ing are fringed with a form of prayer, but he will 
devour a widow's house the next moment, and say- 
grace after the meal. An Arabian proverb says, " A 
man who has been a pilgrimage to Mecca is not to be 
trusted again." Men that have much of this theology, 
and its " piety," generally have a bad name in busi- 
ness. A business man told me he always wanted more 
indorsement on a note from a long-faced man, eminent 
in theology, than from a common citizen who met him 
in the street. " Strict Christians " are said to be worse 
in these matters than other men ; I mean more covet- 
ous, more sly, more grasping, less to be relied upon. 
The severe sects are austere in their theology, loose in 
business ; strict in sacrament, lax in charity ; instant in 
prayer, not seasonable in humane works. If you want 
self-denial to spread abroad the doctrines of their sect, 
there are no men so ready to make such a sacrifice. 
The efforts which have been made in the stricter Amer- 
ican Churches to carry what they call the Gospel — but 
which is only then* theology — to Heathen lands, are 
of immense value to the men who have made the sacri- 
fice ; whether the Heathen are thereby profited I will 
not say. But for works in morality, in philanthropy, in 
charity, these sects are not first and foremost. Of self- 
denial for a theological purpose they have the manliest 
abundance, but of self-denial for humanity the meanest 
lack. 

The present position of the clergy is to be attributed 
to the character of their theology. There are at this 
day about twenty-eight thousand Protestant clergymen 
in the United States, and about a thousand Catholic 
priests. Almost all of them come from the middle 
class in society, — the class most remarkable for in- 
dustry, enterprise, charity, morality, and piety, — in a 



THE POPULAE THEOLOGY. 



133 



word, for religion. They have the most costly culture 
of any class in the nation : the professional education 
of the clergymen has cost the public more than the 
professional culture of all the lawyers ; or all the doctors, 
or all the merchants and men of science and literature 
in the country; for most of these latter men pay for 
their education as they go, or at any rate their fathers 
pay for it, but a large special outlay is made by public 
charity, for the education of the minister, — very prop- 
erly made too. Nine tenths of these, I believe, who 
accept this calling, come to it from a love of it, from a 
desire to serve God in it ; not from selfishness, but with 
the expectation of self-denial. Surely at this day there 
is little from without to attract a man to so thankless a 
calling, for their average pay does not equal that of a 
fireman on a railroad. They count it the holiest and 
most arduous office in the world. But yet, starting from 
that class, with that education, the costliest in the land, 
and with such noble motives, — how very little do they 
bring to pass, in promoting sentiments of love to God 
and men ; how little in diffusing ideas of truth and jus- 
tice, or in any noble action in any practical department 
of life ! They do exceedingly little for any one of the 
three. Many of these men stand in the way of the 
human race, and while mankind is painfully toiling up 
hill they block the wheels forward and not hindward. 

This is not wholly the fault of these men. They are 
earnest and self-denying, and mean to be faithful, most 
of them. But it is the bad theology they start with 
which hinders them, — their false idea of God, of Man, 
and of Religion, — the Relation between God and Mam 

They are working with bad tools, — dull theology, 
dull sermons. Once a clam shell was the best cutting 
instrument which the human race had used or discov- 

12 



134 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



ered. Then it was received with thankfulness of heart. 
But if a man in these times should go out into the 
fields to cut grass or corn with a clam shell, how do 
you think his day's work would compare with that of 
a man who mowed with scythes, or reaped with sickles 
or with shears moved by horses cut down his acre in 
an hour ? Verily the fields are white for harvest, the 
laborers many, but with the clam shell for sickle, they 
tread down more with their feet than they bind up with 
arms ! 

The clergymen cannot defend their theology. At- 
tacks have long ago been made against the philosoph- 
ical part of it, and they have never been repelled ; 
against the historical part of it, and there is no satisfac- 
tory answer thereto. The Unitarians have attacked the 
divinity of Jesus, the Universalists the eternity of hell, 
and the assaults have not been philosophically met. 
There is a breach in the theologic wall, not filled up 
save with denunciations, which are but straws that a 
breath blows off, or which rot of then* own accord. 

Within a few years most serious attacks have been 
made on the " Inspiration of the Scriptures." Its 
physics are shown to be false science, its metaphysics 
false philosophy, its history often mistaken. In Eng- 
land, Mr. Hennell denies the divine origin of Chris- 
tianity, and writes a labored book to prove that it came 
as other forms of religion have come, — the best 
thought of noble men. In Germany, Mr. Strauss, with 
a troop of scholars before and behind him, denies the 
accuracy of the history of the New Testament ; denies 
the divine birth of Jesus, his miracles, his ascension, his 
resurrection — they are what one of the latest writers of 
the New Testament calls " old wives' fables ; " Mr. 
Newman tells of " the Soul, her sorrows and her aspi- 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



135 



rations," and shows the " Phases of Faith " which a 
devout and truthful spirit passes through in the journey 
after religion, exposing the dreadful famine in the 
churches, and showing that much of the popular the- 
ology is a mere show-bread which it is not possible for 
a man to feed on. No man shows that Newman is 
mistaken, none refutes Strauss, no man answers Hen- 
nell. Books enough are written it is true : " Lives of 
Jesus," " Defences of Miracles," " Evidences of Chris- 
tianity," — to prove that some men wrote some books 
with such miraculous helps from God that they could 
make no mistakes, but yet the mistakes are there in the 
books ; — " Voices of the Church," " Eclipses of Faith," 
and the like, and denunciations " Against Freethink- 
ing," without stint. Now and then a feeble charge is 
repelled, a weak position of the assailant is reconquered, 
but still the theologians are continually beaten and 
driven back before the well served artillery of thought. 

Church-membership is thought a needful condition 
of salvation : without that a man is not a Christian in 
full, and is not sure of any thing good hereafter. But 
very few join the Church. Of the twenty-three millions 
of America, there are not three and a half million mem- 
bers of the Protestant Church, not one hundred and 
thirty to a minister ; — a little more than three million 
Protestant church-members, a little more than three 
million slaves also. Singular statistics ! so many 
church-members, so many slaves ! There were never so 
many voters with so small a proportion of church-mem- 
bers ; never so small a proportionate sprinkling of bap- 
tism in the face of the community ; never so little taking 
of the sacraments of the Church. 

Ecclesiastical interests do not thrive. Compare the 
interest men feel in a bank, in a manufacturing com- 



136 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



pany, in a lyceum, with what they take in a Church. 
And yet the minister tells them that the bank, the ly- 
ceum, and the manufactory are only for to-day and to- 
morrow — for the body while the Church is for the soul, 
and forever ! 

What is the reason of this lack of interest ? Even 
clergymen themselves partake of the general dulness, 
and do not study vigorously as the doctors and men of 
science ; do not plead for the souls of men, as the 
lawyer for their money ; do not toil as the merchant or 
mechanic for his gain. Ministers do not study the 
science of their calling as the physician, the engineer, 
the manufacturer of cloth or leather, the geologist, the 
watchmaker, studies the science of his calling. Even 
the almanac-maker is a philosopher ; the clergyman, — 
how seldom does he show any tinge of analogous cul- 
ture ? 

In practical affairs the American clergy have but little 
good influence on public morals and manners ; an in- 
fluence not at all in proportion to the number, the edu- 
cation, the character, the position, and the motives of 
these men. 

Politicians declare there is no law higher than an Act 
of Congress, which makes it felony to give a cup of cold 
water to a man fleeing from bondage. What do the 
clergymen say ? " The powers that be are ordained of 
God, and whoso resisteth the powers that be, resisteth 
the ordinance of God." " Religion is an excellent 
thing," says the politician, " for every thing but politics : 
there it makes men mad." The minister does not say, 
" I am not mad, most noble Festus, but speak forth the 
words of soberness and truth : " — not at all. Felix 
trembled before Paul preaching; now Paul in the pul- 
pit, preaching, trembles before Felix in the pew, slum- 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY 



137 



bering. The statesman says, " Religion must not be 
applied to politics: there let us be practical atheists.' , 
The minister says, " I will not apply religion to politics. 
Be practical atheists there. I will not disturb you. 
My Kingdom is not of this world." 

Traders apply to business the same principle which 
the politician applies to the State, and say, " Religion 
is an excellent thing everywhere but in business : there 
it makes men mad. The £ golden rule ' is the last one 
that the merchant ought to have in his desk; it is 
wholly unknown to the official ' sealer of weights and 
measures.' Let us not apply religion to business." 
The clergymen answer, " Let us not apply religion to 
business. Here let us be practical atheists together. 
The golden rule is for the pulpit desk; for Sunday, 
not for the counting-house and the merchant's shop. 
Religion is to get the soul saved, not to prevent the 
extortion of the usurer, or the tyranny of the oppressor. 
Business is business, religion is religion." 

Different traders make particular application of this 
rule to their several specialities. The liquor dealer 
says, " Religion is an excellent thing everywhere but 
in the rum trade : there it makes men mad. Let us 
never apply it to the sale of intoxicating drink." The 
clergyman says, " Let it be so." The dealer in human 
flesh declares, " Religion is a most excellent thing in all 
matters except slave-trading : there it makes men mad. 
Let us not apply religion to the 'patriarchal institu- 
tion.' " The clergyman answers, " Slavery is of God. 
Abraham was a slave-holder ; Christ Jesus says nothing 
against the worst evils of Grecian or of Roman slavery, 
— not a word against buying slaves, breeding slaves, 
selling slaves, beating slaves, or putting them to death. 
It is plain that he approved of the institution, and de- 

12* 



138 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



signed that it should be perpetual. The great Apostle 
to the Gentiles sent back a runaway slave, thus execut- 
ing the fugitive slave act of those times, and giving an 
example to Christians 1 to fulfil all righteousness.' It is 
only ' natural religion ' which forbids slavery, the heath- 
enism of pagan Seneca and Modestinus. Christians 
are not in a state of Nature, but of Grace. One of 
'the advantages of a revelation' is this — the kidnapper 
may keep his bondmen forever. Mr. Jefferson said all 
men are created equal, and endowed by their Creator 
with certain natural and unalienable Rights, amongst 
others with the Right to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit 
of Happiness. He was an infidel, stumbling by the 
light of Nature ; but we have a more excellent way, 
and hold slaves by divine revelation which transcends 
the light of Nature. Let us not destroy slavery by 
1 natural religion,' but preserve it by ' Christianity.' It 
is a good thing to have as many slaves as church- 
members ! " 

At this day the popular preaching does very little to 
correct the great popular sins of the people. It does 
more to encourage them. Here are the vices of the 
leading class of men in their period of calculation after 
the period of passion has passed by — covetousness of 
money, ambition for political and social rank. Both of 
these are unscrupulous in their modes of action. Does 
the body of clergymen do any thing to correct this evil, 
— corruption in trade, corruption in politics? Far 
more I think to encourage each of these leading vices 
of the age. 

America invades the other nations. The pulpit never 
stands in front of the cannon. Who preached against 
the Mexican War ? How many ministers, think you, 
in the twenty-eight thousand Protestant pulpits ? Who 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



139 



will preach against the present national lust for land ? 
Extortioners levy their usury to the ruin of the bor- 
rower, — the pulpit does not say a word against it. 
Politicians declare that the great object of government 
is the protection of property, — the pulpit knows no 
higher object for government; "take care of the rich 
and they will take care of the poor." Intemperance 
floods the cities, fills the Almshouse and the Jail, — the 
pulpit says but little : thank God, in humble places it 
does say something, though the metropolitan pulpit 
commonly " hangs out " for Rum. Licentiousness 
mows down the beauty of the girl, and prostitutes the 
manly dignity of the man, — but the pulpit is silent as 
the house of death. It has forgotten the book of Prov- 
erbs. The kidnapper comes to Boston, New York, 
Philadelphia, to seize our fellow-worshippers, — and 
most of the churches are on his side. In this city, a 
man fleeing from slavery, seized by ruffians and con- 
fined in our illegal jail, brought into most imminent 
peril, sends round his petition to the churches for their 
prayer ; the churches are dumb ; eloquent ministers 
come out and defend the stealing of men. The Amer- 
ican pulpit is powerless against sin : it is a dumb dog 
that cannot bark at the wolf. The great Rabbis of the 
popular theology are on the side of every popular sin. 
What Roman augur ever opposed a Roman wicked- 
ness ? 

All over the world woman is in a state of subjection 
to man, almost everywhere counted inferior to him, a 
tool for his convenience, created only because it was 
" not good for him to be alone ; " throughout Christen- 
dom deprived of the ecclesiastical, political, and aca- 
demic rights or privileges of men, and consequently 



140 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



oppressed by the strong arm. What has the Christian 
Church to say ? 

Do not blame the minister too much. He is the 
victim of his theological circumstances, and is com- 
monly a great deal better than his creed. He is wiser 
than he dares to preach. His theology tells him that 
religion is not for the earth but for Heaven ; not to 
make the world better, but insurance on souls, to get 
them saved from an angry God. What he calls 
" means of Grace " are not a diligent use of all out 
faculties of body and mind, each in its normal mode 
of activity; but the vicarious sufferings of Jesus of 
Nazareth are the Divine Cause, and a belief in the 
popular theology is the Human Condition ; all our 
" righteousnesses are as filthy rags," and shelter no 
man from the wrath of God and the flames of hell. It 
tells him that the function of the minister is not to pro- 
mote piety and morality, but first, to intercede with an 
offended God for the sake of an offending people ; next, 
to administer the sacrament of baptism, — to sprinkle 
a little water on the face of a baby, — and of the Chris- 
tian communion, — to give some men a morsel of 
bread to eat and a drop of wine to drink in the meet- 
ing-house ; and next to expound the Scriptures accord- 
ing to the standard of his sect. That is the ecclesiastic 
theological function of a minister, whereby he is " to 
save souls ; " this he thinks is " to preach Christ and 
Him crucified." So the churches are not chiefly insti- 
tutions of religion, to teach piety and morality ; but in- 
stitutions of theology, and are controlled not by the 
blameless religion of Jesus, but by Theology and Mam- 
mon. In small country towns where the people are 
ruled by the clergy, the churches are mainly controlled 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



141 



by Theology ; and in large wealthy towns, where 
another class of men bears sway, they are controlled 
chiefly by Mammon. The Church sitting on her cocka- 
trice's eggs in the one case, hatches mainly churchlings, 
and in the other chiefly wordlings. 

So the churches are no defence against political 
tyranny: they are on its side; in old England, New 
England, France, Germany, Russia, all through Chris- 
tendom, the churches side with despotic power. They 
are no protection against practical atheism : if the 
statesmen say, " There is no Higher Law," the leading 
clergy answer " Very true ! there is none." They are 
no defence against covetousness : the great ecclesiastical 
teachers of Christendom are its allies. All the popular 
vices are sure to have the churches on their side. 

None of the great ideas of the times originate with 
the clergy and the Church : new thought is not gener- 
ated there. Theology keeps 

" Hawking at geology and schism," 

and hates new ideas. None of the great sentiments 
of devotion to God are cradled there : Theology mum- 
bles its ritual, and scoffs at the light of Christian senti- 
ment. None of the great philanthropies begin there : 
Theology is getting men saved from future torment, 
and kills philanthropy. The temperance movement, the 
peace movement, the education movement, the anti- 
slavery movement, the great movement for the eleva- 
tion of woman, the philanthropy which would heal the 
criminal, cure the sick, teach the deaf, dumb, blind, and 
the fool, — all these are foreign to the Church and the 
clergy, to the popular theology which underlies both. 
You know the qualities most valued in a man called 



142 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



Christian, in all the sects of the sectarian churches : — 
belief in all the doctrines of his sect ; a devout attend- 
ance on all the forms thereof ; a sad countenance ; — 
much talk on theological matters ; the reading of theo- 
logical books. That makes up what is called " Chris- 
tianity." Do you think that Jesus would recognize 
such things as " the essentials of religion " in one of 
his followers ? 

How would you judge of the health of a man who 
proceeded in that way ; a man who was thick with the 
doctors, who was always puddering with medicine, and 
reading medical treatises, and everlastingly in a fuss 
about his head, or his heart, or his stomach, — his di- 
gestion, or his circulation ? Would you think that was 
a proof that he was sound and healthy ? The doctors 
might say he was a very good patient, but a very silly 
man. 

A celebrated clergyman of America once preached a 
funeral sermon on a distinguished statesman then lately 
deceased. The minister claimed the politician as an 
exemplary follower of Christ, " He had full faith in the 
leading doctrines of the Gospel." What do you think 
they were ? Jesus of Nazareth would be a little 
amazed to hear: "the sinfulness of man; the divinity 
of Christ ; the necessity of his atonement ; need of 
being born again, and that his own personal hope of 
salvation depended on the promises and grace of Christ, 
and that he now wished to throw himself upon it as a 
practical and blessed remedy." That was what a Doc- 
tor of Divinity took for proof that a famous American 
statesman, almost eighty years old, was a Christian! 
He did not ask for piety, not for morality, only for a 
belief in these doctrines of the popular theology. 

If Jesus of Nazareth were to come back, and bear 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



143 



the same relation to the nineteenth century which he 
bore so blessedly to the first, it seems to me that the 
first thing he would preach against is what is called 
" Christianity n in these days ; — I mean the Theology 
of Christendom. 

This theology is the greatest evil of our times. It 
stands in the way of the emancipation of man. It 
defends the despotism of the Church, and the despotism 
of the State, the despotism of the noble over the prol- 
etary in Europe, of the master over the slave in 
America, of the capitalist over the laborer, of the 
rich over the poor, of the learned over the ignorant, 
and last of all, the despotism of man over woman. It 
is a lion in the path of humankind. 

This theology rests on two great pillars as its founda- 
tion, the Jachin and Boaz of theology. 

I. The notion that God is finite in his wisdom, jus- 
tice, love, and holiness — only infinite in power to damn ; 
that He is a jealous, angry, and revengeful God, with 
eternal hell behind him, wherein he will torture forever 
the vast majority of his children, and that Man is wicked 
by nature, subject to the wrath of God, and utterly in- 
capable, by his own efforts, of escaping from it. 

II. The notion that Christ has made an atonement 
for the sin of the world, and by his sufferings and death 
has mitigated the anger of the Jealous God who has 
given a conditional pardon of sin and promise of sal- 
vation, and that the condition of this Salvation is a 
belief in the popular theology. — which is commonly 
called Faith, « faith in Christ," and « faith in God,"' — 
and a compliance with the ritual of the Church. 

This Theology makes man a worm ; religion a tor- 
ment to all but ten in a million ; immortality a curse 



,144 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



to mankind ; God a devil omnipotent to damn, and his 
rule in time and eternity the most selfish despotism 
which the world ever knew. 



This Theology is not always to last : it is in the 
process of dissolution — there is dry-rot in its limbs. 
Philosophy shows there is no such dreadful God; 
criticism that there is no such atoning sacrifice to 
appease imaginary wrath, no need of such belief, or of 
such compliance ; consciousness knows no such human 
nature as the popular theology proclaims. No, we are 
all conscious of a nature quite different from that. Yea, 
O Father in Heaven, thou hast written of Thyself on 
the walls of human consciousness, and we feel Thee in 
our heart, with all thy Infinite Wisdom, Justice, Love, 
and Holiness. 

This dark theology must pass away. 

It is at this day in the same condition that Judaism 
and Paganism were in Paul's time. Then the great 
priests were Pagans or Jews ; the great philosophers, 
the great philanthropists, were neither Jew nor Pagan. 
Now the great priests are theological Christians, the 
great philosophers far otherwise. The new bud is 
crowding off the old leaf. The great hearts have no 
confidence in this theology ; the great heads have no 
confidence in it ; the great hands have no confi- 
dence in it. The social aristocracy of England seems 
false to religion. A writer, one of the learnedest 
men in Europe, himself really religious, declares that 
since the breaking up of Paganism there has never 
been such a decline of religion in Europe as at this 
day. Another not at all bigoted declares that in Eng- 
land the foremost classes of the people, — men of birth 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



145 



and riches, — have no regard for religion. The labor- 
ing men whose daily toil hardly fills their mouths and 
satisfies their hunger, — they also have small confidence 
in it. The intellectual aristocracy of France and Ger- 
many have mainly turned their faces not only against 
this theology, but against conscious religion itself. 

Well, how much of religion is there in America ? 
Ask the twenty-eight thousand ministers : ask the three 
million, three hundred thousand church-members that 
question : then let the three million, three hundred 
thousand slaves give answer to the question. " The 
dark places of the earth are full of the habitations of 
cruelty ; " the American pulpit knows it, and defends 
the cruelty and the darkness of the dark places of the 
earth. Ask the politician who says there is no Higher 
Law for the State ; ask the trader who says there is no 
Higher Law for business, and who wishes to sign off 
from religion, each in his peculiar vocation, — ask them 
what respect there is for religion in America ! 

You and I, my friends, five in an age when mankind 
has outgrown the popular theology. God be thanked ! 
we have outgrown its idea of God, its idea of Man, 
and its idea of Religion. Hence comes the confusion 
of the times ; hence the denial of religion in politics, 
in trade. We live in an age of transition. The old 
theology will pass away ; depend upon it, it will pass 
away. Philosophers have destroyed its philosophical 
basis, critics have destroyed its historical basis, and it 
swings in the ah' at both ends. That must pass away. 

But Religion, — that will not fade out of the human 
heart : sooner shall yonder sun, which those clouds 
only hide, fade out of heaven. No ! with every advance 
of man religion shines brighter and brighter, leading 
onward to its perfect day. Out of this chaos of the- 

13 



146 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



ology, how beautifully comes up the manly and mild 
and trusting face of Jesus of Nazareth ! Far off, 
severed from us by two thousand years of time, and 
five thousand miles of space, we see him with his beati- 
tudes, his parable of the Good Samaritan, of the Father 
who went after his prodigal son, having more joy in his 
heaven over the one sinner that repented than over the 
ninety and nine that never went astray. How beauti- 
fully comes up that young Nazarene, proclaiming the one 
religion, — love to the Father, and love to the Son — to 
Man here on the earth, for mankind is the Son of God ! 

Coming out of the popular theology, I feel as one 
who has wandered long in some dark, subterranean, 
mammoth cave, where the sound of running water was 
thunderous and sad, — lit by uncertain torches, led by 
wandering guides, where lifeless stones grinned as hor- 
rible monsters at him, and he hesitated and stumbled at 
every step, — where the air was contaminated by the 
smoke of the torches, and his steps faltered and his 
heart sank. I feel as one coming out into the glad 
light of day, where the sky is blue over me, and the sun 
sheds down its golden light, and the ground is green 
with grass, and is beautiful with summer or with 
autumn flowers, fragrant to every sense. 

God be thanked that we leave the cavern behind us, 
with its smoky lights, its paths that lead to wandering ; 
that God's heaven is over us and his ground is under 
our feet, his eternity before us, and his Spirit in our 
spirit. 

" Oh ye, who pined in dungeons for the sake 

Of Truth which tyrants shadowed with their hate, 
Whose only crime was that ye were awake 
Too soon, or that your brethren slept too late ; 
Mountainous minds, upon whose top the great 



THE POPULAR THEOLOGY. 



Sunrise of knowledge came, long e'er its glance 
Fell on the foggy swamps of fear and ignorance ; 

" The time shall come when from your heights serene, 
Beyond the grave, ye will look back and smile, 
To see the plains of earth all growing green, 

Where Science, Art, and Love repeat Heaven's style, 
And with God's beauty fill the desert isle, 
'Till Eden blooms where martyr-fires have burned, 
And to the Lord of life all hearts and minds are turned. 

" The seeds are planted, and the spring is near ; 

Ages of blight are but a fleeting frost : 
Truth circles into Truth. Each mote is dear 

To God, no drop of Ocean is e'er lost, 

No leaf forever dry and tempest-tost. 
Life centres deathless underneath Decay, 
And no true Word or Deed can ever pass away." 



SERMON V. 

OF THEISM AS THEORY. 

13 * < 149 ; 



MATTHEW X. 29. 



ABE NOT TWO SPARROWS SOLD FOR A FARTHING? AND ONE OF THEM 
SHALL NOT FALL ON THE GROUND WITHOUT TOUR FATHER. 

(150) 



V. 



OF SPECULATIVE THEISM, REGARDED AS A 
THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. 



On the last four Sundays I spoke of Atheism, re* 
garded first as a Theory of the Universe, and then as 
a Principle of Ethics ; next of the popular Christian 
Theology, also regarded first as a Theory of the Uni- 
verse, and then as a Principle of Ethics. I have spoken 
of each, as metaphysics and as ethics ; as theory first, 
and then as practice. Both subjects were painful to 
touch, yet needing to be handled at this day. It is 
never pleasant to point out and expose a false theory 
of philosophy, or a false system of practice, and I am 
glad I have passed by that for the present. A good 
man hates to kill any thing, — even snakes and hy- 
aenas. 

I now come to a theme much more pleasant : namely, 
the Philosophical Idea of God. So I ask your atten- 
tion to a Sermon of Speculative Theism, considered as 
a Theory of the Universe ; and next Sunday I hope to 
speak of Theism considered as a Principle of Practice. 
If what I have to say this morning be somewhat ab- 
stract and metaphysical, and closely joined together, 

(151) 



152 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



and rather hard to follow, I beg you will remember that 
this dryness belongs to the nature of the subject, which 
I shall treat as well as I can, and as plain as I may. 

I use the word Theism, first, as distinguished from 
Atheism ; that is, from the absolute denial of all possi- 
ble ideas of God. Second, as distinguished from the 
Popular Theology, which indeed affirms God, but as- 
cribes to Him a finite character, and makes Him a fero- 
cious God. And third, as distinguished from Deism, 
which affirms a God without the ferocious character of 
the popular theology, but still starts from the sensa- 
tional philosophy, abuts in materialism, derives its idea 
of God solely by induction from the phenomena of ma- 
terial nature, or of human history, leaving out of sight 
the intuition of human nature ; and so gets its idea of 
God solely from external observation, and not at ail 
from consciousness, and thus accordingly, represents 
God as finite and imperfect. I use the word as dis- 
tinguished from Atheism, the denial of God ; from the 
Popular Theology, which affirms a finite ferocious God ; 
and from Deism, which affirms a finite God without 
ferocity. So much for the definition of terms. 

Some of you may perhaps remember the introductory 
sermon of last year's course, treating of the Infinite Per- 
fection of God. In that discourse I started from human 
nature, from the facts of consciousness in your heart 
and in my heart, assuming only the fidelity of the 
human faculties, then power to ascertain truth in relig- 
ious matters, as in philosophical and mathematical 
matters ; and I showed, or think I showed, that those 
faculties of human nature — the intellectual, the moral, 
the affectional, and the simply religious — in their 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



153 



joint and normal exercise, led to the idea of God as 
a Being infinitely powerful, infinitely wise, infinitely 
just, infinitely loving, and infinitely holy, that is, faithful 
to Himself. 

To-day I start with that conclusion as a fact. I shall 
not undertake to prove the actuality of this idea, — the 
existence of the infinite God ; I shall take it for granted. 
I did not undertake to prove the existence of a God 
against Atheism ; nor the non-existence of the ferocious 
God against the Popular Theology. At this stage of 
proceeding I shall assume the existence of the Infinite 
God, relying for proof on what has been said so often 
before, and still more, on what is felt in your conscious- 
ness, without my saying any thing. Only for clearness 
of conception, let me state some of the most important 
matters connected with the idea of God. 

I. There must be many qualities of God not at all 
known to men, some of them not at all know-able by us ; 
because we have not the faculties to know them by. 
Man's consciousness of God, and God's consciousness 
of himself must differ immeasurably. God's ideas of 
himself must differ as much from our idea of him, as 
the constellation called the Great Bear differs from one 
of the beasts in the public den at Berne. For no man 
can ever have an exhaustive conception of God, — one 
I mean which uses up and comprises the whole of God. 
We have scarcely an exhaustive conception of any 
thing. Certain properties and forces of things we 
know; the substance of things is almost, if not quite 
beyond our ken. But we may have such an idea of 
God as though incomplete, is perfectly true, and com- 
prises no quality which is not also a quality of God. 
Then our idea of God is true as far as it goes, only it 



154 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



does not describe the whole of God. To illustrate 
this, — a thimble cannot contain all the water in the 
Atlantic Ocean at once, but it may be brimful of water 
from the Atlantic Ocean ; and it may contain nothing 
but water from the Atlantic Ocean. So our idea of 
God, though not containing the whole of him, may yet 
comprise no quality which is not a quality of God, and 
may omit none which it is needful for our welfare, that 
we should know. In the self-consciousness of God 
subject and object are the same, and he must know all 
his own Infinite Nature. But in our consciousness of 
God the limitations of the finite subject make it impos- 
sible that we should comprehend God as he is conscious 
of himself. It is enough for us to know of the Infinite 
what is knowable to finite man. 

With qualities not knowable to us I have nothing to 
do. I shall not undertake to discuss the psychology and 
metaphysics of God. The metaphysics of man are quite 
hard enough for me to grapple with and understand. 

II. Then as a next thing, God must be different in 
kind from what I call the Universe ; that is from Na- 
ture, the world of Matter, and from Spirit, the world of 
Man. They are finite, He infinite ; they dependent, 
He self-subsisting ; they variable, He unchanging. God 
must include both, matter and spirit. 

There are two classes of philosophers often called 
Atheists; but better, and perhaps justly, called Pan- 
theists. 

One of these says, " there are only material things in 
existence," resolving all into matter ; " The sum-total 
of these material things is God." That is material 
Pantheism. If I mistake not, M. Comte of Paris, and 
the anonymous author of the " Vestiges of the Natural 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



155 



History of Creation," with their numerous coadjutors, 
belong to that class. 

The other class admits the existence of spirit, some- 
times resolves every thing into spirit, and says, "the 
sum total of finite spirit, that is God." These are 
spiritual Pantheists. Several of the German philos- 
ophers, if I understand them, are of that stamp. 

One difficulty with both of these classes is this : 
Their idea of God is only the idea of the world of 
Nature and of Spirit, as it is to-day ; and as the world 
of Nature and of Spirit will be fairer and wiser a 
thousand years hence than it is now, so, according to 
them, God will be fairer and wiser a thousand years 
hence than he is now. Thus they give you a variable 
God, who learns by experience, and who grows with 
the growth and strengthens with the strength of the 
universe itself. According to them, when there was no 
vegetation in the world of matter, God knew nothing 
of a plant ; no more than the stones on the earth. 
When the animal came, when man came, God was 
wiser, and He advances with the advance of man. 
When Jesus came, He was a better God ; He was a 
wiser God, after Newton and La Place ; and was more 
a philosophical Being, after those pantheistic philos- 
ophers had taught him the way to be so : for their 
God knows nothing until it is either a fact of observa- 
tion in finite Nature — in the material world, — or else 
a fact of consciousness in finite Spirit — in some man; 
He knows nothing till it is shown Him. That is a fatal 
error with Hegel and his followers in England and 
America. 

Mr. Babbage, a most ingenious Englishman, invented 
a calculating engine. He builded wiser than he knew ; 
for by and by he found that his engine calculated con- 



156 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



elusions which had never entered into the thought of 
Mr. Babbage himself. The mathematical engine out- 
ciphered its inventor. And these men represent God 
as being in just that predicament: the world is con- 
stantly revealing things unknown before, and which 
God had not conceived of. As there is a Progressive 
Development of the powers of the Universe as a whole, 
and of each man, so there is a Progressive Development 
of God. He is therefore not so much a Being, as a 
Becoming. 

This idea of an Improvable and Progressive Deity is 
not wholly a new thing. The doctrine was obscurely 
held by some of the ancient philosophers in the time of 
Plato. 

If God be Infinite, then he must be immanent, per- 
fectly and totally present, in Nature and in Spirit. Thus 
there is no point of space, no atom of matter, but God 
is there ; no point of spirit, and no atom of soul, but God 
is there. And yet finite matter and finite spirit do not 
exhaust God. He transcends the world of matter and 
of spirit; and in virtue of that transcendence con- 
tinually makes the world of matter fairer, and the 
world of spirit wiser. So there is really a progress in 
the Manifestation of God, not a progress in God the 
manifesting. In thought you may annihilate the world 
of matter and of man ; but you do not thereby in 
thought annihilate the infinite God, or subtract any 
thing from the Existence of God. In thought you may 
double the world of matter and of man ; but in so 
doing you do not in thought double the Being of the 
Infinite God ; that remains the same as before. 

That is what I mean when I say that God is infinite 
and transcends matter and spirit, and is different in kind 
from the finite universe. This is the great point in 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



157 



which I differ most widely from those philosophers. I 
find no fault with them ; I differ from their conclusion. 

III. As a third thing, the Infinite God must have all 
the Qualities of a perfect and complete Being ; must 
be complete in the qualities of a perfect being, perfect 
in the qualities of a complete one. To state that by- 
analysis which I have just stated by synthesis: He 
must have the perfection of Being, self-existence ; the 
perfection of Power, almightiness ; the perfection of 
Mind, all-knowingness ; the perfection of Conscience,, 
all-righteousness ; of Affection, all-lovingness ; of Soul, 
all-holiness, perfect self-fidelity. Hence, as the result 
of all these : He must have the perfection of Will, ab- 
solute freedom. I mean to say, according to this idea 
of God, there must be no limitation to his existence, his 
power, his wisdom, his justice, his love, his holiness,, 
and his freedom ; none from any outward cause, or any 
inward cause whatsoever. The classic, or Greek and 
Roman Idea of God, represented him as finite, limited, 
subjectively by elements of his own character, objec- 
tively limited by the elements of the material world ; 
the popular theological idea in fact represents him as 
finite, limited subjectively by selfishness, wrath, and 
various evil passions, objectively by elements in the 
world of men which continually prove refractory, and 
turn out as he did not intend. In this matter of the 
Infinity of God, I differ from the popular theology, as 
well as from the common scheme of philosophy. 

So much for the Idea of God considered as Infinite ; 
so much for its diversity from the common schemes. 

Now look at this philosophical Theism, with its Idea 

14 



158 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



of the Infinite God, as a Theory of the Universe. Let 
me divide the universe into two great parts. One I 
will call the World of Matter, and the other the World 
of Spirit. By the world of matter I mean every thing, 
except the Deity, known to us that is not man ; and by 
the world of spirit I mean what is man, — both man in 
his material substance, and in his spiritual substance. 
Let me say a word of each. For shortness' sake, I will 
call the world of matter Nature. I begin with this, as 
it i^ the least difficult. 

In Nature God must be both a perfect Cause, and a 
perfect Providence. 

I. Of God as perfect Cause. Creation itself, the 
non-existent coming into existence, is something unin- 
telligible to us. But this we know, that the Infinite 
God must be a perfect Creator, the sole and undisturbed 
author of all that is in Nature. So there must be a 
complete and perfect harmony and concord between 
God and the Nature which he creates, God and his 
works must be at one ; and Nature, so far as it goes, 
must represent the Will and Purpose of God, and noth- 
ing but the will and purpose of God. So, there can be 
nothing in Nature which God did not put in Nature 
from himself. 

Well, God must have made Nature first, from a per- 
fect Motive ; next, of perfect Material ; third, for a per- 
fect Purpose or end ; fourth, as perfect Means to achieve 
that purpose. That is — the motive for creation, the 
purpose of creation, must be in perfect harmony with 
the infinity of God ; in harmony with his infinite power, 
wisdom, justice, love, and holiness : the material of 
Nature, and the means therein, with the constant modes 
of operation thereof — the Laws of Nature, must be 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



159 



perfectly adequate to the perfect purpose, and so must 
be in complete harmony with the Infinite God ; with 
his infinite power, infinite wisdom, justice, love, and 
holiness. That is very plain, following unavoidably 
from the Idea of God as Infinite. 

Now a perfect Motive for creation, — what will that 
be ? It must be absolute Love producing a desire to 
bless every thing which he creates ; that is, a desire to 
confer such a form and degree of welfare on each thing 
which he makes as is perfectly consistent with the 
character and nature of that thing made ; that is, with 
its highest form and degree of welfare. Absolute Love 
is a perfect motive. 

A perfect Purpose or end of creation is the achieve- 
ment of that bliss ; not the achievement thereof to-day, 
but ultimatelv. Perfect Material and Means are those 
which perfectly achieve that purpose ; not to-day, or 
when I will, or when the thing created wills, but when 
the infinite wisdom and love of God wills. 

The Infinite God must create all from a perfect 
motive, for a perfect purpose of perfect material, as 
perfect means ; for you cannot conceive of a God in- 
finitely powerful, wise, just, loving, and holy, creating 
any thing from an evil motive, for an evil purpose, from 
evil material, or as evil means. No more can you con- 
ceive of the Infinite God creating any thing from an 
imperfect motive, for an imperfect purpose, of imperfect 
material, or as imperfect means. Each of these sup- 
positions is wholly inconsistent with the idea of the 
Lifinite God ; for He can have only perfect motives, 
perfect purposes, perfect material, and perfect means to 
create out of, and to create by. This being so, you see 
that the selfishness and destructiveness ascribed to God 
in the popular theology are at once struck out of exist- 



160 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



ence. For such selfishness and destructiveness are 
absolutely impossible to the Infinite God. 

II. Next, of God as perfect Providence. Creation 
and Providence are but modifications of the same func- 
tion. Creation is momentary providence ; providence, 
perpetual creation : one is described by a point ; the 
other by a line. Now God is just as much present in 
a blade of grass, or an atom of mahogany, this clay 
and in every moment of its existence, as he was at the 
instant of its creation. Men say, " When God created 
matter he was present therein." Very true ! but he is 
just as present therein, with all his powers, and just as 
active with all his perfections, at every moment while 
that matter exists, as he was when it was first created. 
Men tell us, when they read the Bible, " How grand it 
must have been to have stood in the presence of God 
when Moses miraculously smote the rock, which gushed 
with miraculous water." But every drop of water, 
which falls from my roof in a shower, or from my 
finger, thus, as I lift it in this cup, — has as much the 
presence of God in it as when, in Biblical phrase, 
" the morning stars sang together, and the Sons of God 
shouted for joy," at the creation of water itself. It 
cannot be created without God ; it cannot subsist 
without God. 

Here, too, in his Providence, the motive, the end, the 
material and means, must be infinitely perfect. Let 
me develop this a moment. 

God at the creation must have known the action and 
history of each thing which he called into being just as 
well as he knows it now ; for God's knowledge is not 
a becoming wiser by experience, but a being wise by 
nature. The Infinite God must know every movement 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



161 



of every particle of matter. We generally assent to 
that in the gross, and reject it in the detail. Let me 
give an example. 

All the powers, and consequently all the action, 
movements, and history of the whole Universe of mat- 
ter, whereof this solar system is a part, a single — 

" Branch of Stars we see, 
Hung in the golden galaxy ; " 

all the powers, actions, movements, and history of the 
solar system itself, of its primaries and secondaries, must 
have been completely and perfectly known to God be- 
fore the universe, or any single " branch of stars," had 
its existence. So the powers and consequent history 
and movement of every particular thing on each of these 
orbs must have been known. The action and history 
of the mineral matter on the earth in its inorganic form, 
in the form of crystal, liquid, gas ; — the action and 
history of vegetable matter in the fucus, the lichen, and 
the tree ; — and so of aiiimal matter, in the mollusk, the 
eagle, and the elephant, — all must have been completely 
and perfectly known by God before their creation ; eter- 
nally known to him. The powers, and so the history, 
of each atom in Nature must have been as thoroughly 
known to the Mind of the Universe a million million 
years ago, as at this day ; in their cause as well as by 
their effects. 

For example, God must have known, at the moment 
of creation, the present position of this crescent moon 
which beautifies the early evening hour ; and he must 
have known, too, the history of these molecules of car- 
bon that make up the cotton thread which binds the 
sheets of this sermon together. 

To say it short, the statics and dynamics of the 
14* 



162 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



universe, and of each atom thereof, must have been 
eternally and thoroughly known to God. And each 
atom with its statical and dynamical powers, — the 
mineral, vegetable, and animal forces of the universe — 
must have been created by him, from perfect motives, of 
perfect material, for a perfect purpose, and as perfect 
means ; they must be continually sustained by him, and 
he must be just as present and just as active in each 
moment of the existence of any one of these things as 
at the creation thereof, or at the creation of the all 
of things. So, then, each of these must have been 
created with a perfect knowledge of its powers, ac- 
tions, movements, and history, and created from love 
as motive, for ultimate good as purpose, of materials 
proportionate to the motive, and so adequate to the 
end, and accordingly provided with the means of ac- 
complishing that, purpose ; for the infinite perfection 
of God would allow no absolute evil, no absolute 
imperfection, in his motive, or his material, in his pur- 
pose, or his means. If there were any such absolute 
evil or imperfection in the created, it could only have 
come from an absolute evil or imperfection in the Cre- 
ator ; that is, from a lack of infinite power, wisdom, 
justice, or love — because God has not love enough to 
wish all things well; or justice enough to will them 
well ; or wisdom enough to contrive them well ; or 
power enough to make them well. 

Each thing which God has made has a Right to be 
created from perfect motives, for a perfect purpose, from 
perfect material, and as perfect means ; and a right, 
also, to be perfectly provided for. I know, to some men 
it will sound irreverent to speak of the Right of the 
created in relation to the Creator, and of the consequent 
Duty and Obligation of the Creator in relation to the 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



163 



created. But the Infinite God is infinitely just, and it 
is with the highest reverence that I ask, " Shall not the 
God of all the earth do right ? " It is the highest rev- 
erence for the Creator to say that " He gives his crea- 
tures a Right to him, to him as infinite Cause, to him 
as infinite Providence ; " and I count it impious to say 
that God has a right to create even a worm from im- 
perfect motives, for an imperfect purpose, of imperfect 
material, as imperfect means. This right of the crea- 
ture depends on the nature of the thing, on its quality 
as a creation of the infinite God ; not on the quantity 
of being it has received from Him. So of course it is 
equal in all ; the same in the smallest " motes that peo- 
ple the sunbeams," and the greatest man ; all have a 
birthright to the perfect Providence of the Lifinite God ; 
an unalienable right to protection by his infinite power, 
wisdom, justice, love, and holiness. This lien on the 
Infinity of God vests in the substance of their finite 
nature, and is not to be voided by any accident of their 
history, for that accident must have been known and 
provided for as one of the consequences of their powers. 
Each thing has the infinite perfection of God as guar- 
antee to that right. God is security for the miiverse, 
and his hand is indorsed on every great and little thing 
which he has made. Then, if am sure of God and his 
infinity, I am sure beforehand of the ultimate welfare of 
every thing which God has made, for the Infinite Fa- 
ther is the pledge and collateral security, the indorser 
therefor. 

We cannot comprehend the details of this Providence, 
more than of creating, nor fully understand the mode of 
attaining the end ; the mode of terminating, originating, 
and sustaining are equally unintelligible to us ; but the 
fact we know from the idea of God as Lifinite. As we 



164 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



cannot with a Gunter's chain measure the distance be- 
tween the sun and the earth, but as by calculation, 
starting from facts of internal consciousness and ex- 
ternal observation, we can measure it with greater pro- 
portionate exactness than a carpenter could measure ihe 
desk under my hand : — so we cannot understand God's 
mode of operation as Cause or Providence, more than 
an Indian baby, newly born, in Shawneetown, could 
understand the astronomer's mode of operation in cal- 
culating the distance between the earth and the sun ; 
but as we have this idea of God, though we know not 
the mode of operation, the middle terms which intervene 
betwixt the purpose and the achievement, we are yet 
sure of the fact that the motive, purpose, material, and 
means are all proportionate to the nature of the Creator, 
and adequate for the welfare of the created. 

In Nature God is the only Cause, the only Provi- 
dence, the only Power; ihe law of Nature, — that is, the 
constant mode of action of the forces of the material 
world — represents the modes of action of God Him- 
self, his thought made visible ; and as he is infinite, 
unchangeably perfect, and perfectly unchangeable, his 
mode of action is therefore constant and universal, 
so that there can be no such thing as a violation 
of God's constant mode of action ; for there is no 
power to violate it except God himself, and the in- 
finitely perfect God could not violate his own perfect 
modes of action. And accordingly there can be no 
chance, no evil, no imperfection, in motive or purpose, 
in material or means, or in the modes of action thereof. 
Everywhere is calculated order, nowhere chance and 
confusion ; everywhere regular, constant modes of ac- 
tion of the forces in the material world, unvarying and 
eternal laws, nowhere is there an extemporaneous mir- 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



165 



acle. Men have their precarious makeshifts ; the In- 
finite has no tricks and subterfuges, — not a Whim in 
God, and so not a Miracle in Nature. Seeming chance 
is real direction ; what looks like evil in Nature is real 
good. The sparrow that falls to-day does not fall to 
ruin, but to ultimate welfare. Though we know not 
the mode of operation, there must be another world for 
the sparrow as for man. 

So much for this Theism as a Theory of the World 
of Matter. Now a word for it as a Theory of the 
World of Spirit, of the World of Man. This shall in- 
clude man so far as he is matter ; and so far as he is 
matter and something more. 

Look at this first in the most general way, in relation 
to Human Nature, — to Mankind as a whole ; then I 
will come down to particulars. Here the same thing is 
to be said as of Nature ; namely, the Infinite God must 
be a perfect Cause thereof, and have created the world 
of man from perfect motives, for a perfect purpose, of 
perfect material, as perfect means. God has no other 
motive, purpose, material, or means. The perfect mo- 
tive must be Absolute Love — producing the desire to 
bless the world of man, that is, the desire to confer 
thereon a form and degree of welfare which is perfectly 
consistent with the entire nature of man. The perfect 
purpose must be the attainment of that bliss ; the ulti- 
mate attainment not to-day, or when man wills, but 
when the Infinite God wills. Perfect material is that 
which is capable of this welfare ; and perfect means are 
such as achieve it. 

So much for God considered as a perfect Cause in 



166 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



the world of man. I need not here further repeat what 
I just said of creation in the world of matter. 

But God must be also perfect Providence for the 
world of man ; He must be perpetually present therein, 
in each portion thereof. Men think that God was pres- 
ent in some moment of time, at the creation of man- 
kind. Very true ! but in each moment of mankind's 
existence since, God is just as present ; for providence 
is a continuous line of creations, and God is as much 
present, and as much active, at every point of that line 
as at the beginning or end thereof. I know men speak 
of yielding up the spirit and going out of the body, 
going to God. Is not God about, within, and around 
us, while we are in the body, just as much as when we 
shake off the known and enter on that untried being ? 

God must have known at the creation all the action 
and history of the world of man as well as of Nature. 
It is not to be supposed that ten thousand years ago 
God knew less of human history than he knows to- 
day. That would be to make God imperfect in his 
wisdom, growing wiser by experience. Napoleon's 
coup cV etat was a surprise to mankind ten months ago. 
Do you think it was an astonishment to God ten 
months ago ? was it not infinitely known hundreds of 
millions of years ago ; eternally known ? It must have 
been so. 

I know the question is here more complicated than 
in Nature, for in Nature there is only one force, the 
direct statical and dynamical action of matter ; and ac- 
cordingly it is easy to calculate the action and result of 
mechanical, vegetable, electrical, and vital forces. But 
in the world of man there is a certain amount of free- 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



167 



dom, which seems to make the question difficult. In 
that part of the world of Nature not endowed with 
animal life, there is no margin of oscillation ; and you 
may know just where the moon will be to-night, and 
where it will be a thousand years hence. The constant 
forces, with their compensations, may all be known ; 
and so every nutation of the moon is calculable with 
entire certainty. The modes of action there are as lit- 
tle variable as the maxims of geometry. The moon's 
node is an invariable consequent of material necessity. 
When a star with fiery hair came splendoring through 
the night, it filled mediasval astronomers with amaze- 
ment ; and celibate priests, divorced from Nature, shook 
with superstitious fear as it wrote its hieroglyphic of 
God over Byzantium or Rome : was God astonished at 
his wandering and hairv star ? 

In the world of animals there is a small margin of 
oscillation ; but you are pretty sure to know what the 
animals will do, that the beaver will build his dam and 
the wren her nest just as their fathers built ; that every 
bee next summer will make her six-sided cell with the 
same precision and geometric economy of material and 
space wherewith her ancestors wrought ten thousand 
years ago, solving the problem of isoperimetrical 
figures. 

But man has a certain amount of freedom ; a larger 
margin of oscillation, wherein he vibrates from side to 
side. The nod of Lord Burleigh is a variable contin- 
gent of human caprice. Hence it is thought that God 
could not foreknow the oscillations of caprice in the 
human race, in the Adamitic Cain of ancient poetry, or 
the Napoleonic Cain of contemporaneous history, till 
after they took place. But that conclusion comes only 
from putting our limitations on God. It is difficult for 



168 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



the astronomer's little boy to measure the cradle he 
sleeps in, or to tell what time it is by the nursery clock ; 
but the astronomer can measure the vast orbit of Le- 
verrier's star before seeing it, and correct his nursery 
clock by the great dial hung up in heaven itself : yet 
the difference between the mind of the astronomer's boy 
and the mind of the astronomer is nothing compared 
to the odds between finite intellect and the infinite un- 
derstanding of God. So though the greater complica- 
tion makes it more difficult for you and me to under- 
stand the consciousness of free men, whose feelings, 
thoughts, and consequent actions are such manifold 
contingents, it is not at all more difficult for God. 

Before the creation the Infinite God, as perfect Cause 
and Providence, must have known all the powers and 
consequent actions, movements, and history of the col- 
lective world of men, and each individual thereof. For, 
either man has no freedom at all, or he has some free- 
dom of will. 

In the first case, if he has no freedom, no margin of 
oscillation, the fore-knowableness of his actions does 
not differ from that of the world of matter ; and the 
nutation of the moon and the nod of Lord Burleigh are 
equally the invariable consequent of material or human 
necessity. Then God is the only force in the human 
world, and of course, without difficulty, knows all its 
action, for a knowledge of the world is only part of his 
consciousness of himself; the treachery of Judas and 
the faithfulness of Jesus are then but facts of the divine 
self-consciousness. 

If there be freedom, then God, as the perfect Cause 
of man's freedom of will, must have perfectly under- 
stood the powers of that freedom ; and understanding 
perfectly the powers, he knew perfectly all the actions, 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



169 



movements, and history thereof, at the moment of crea- 
tion as well as to-day. The perfect Cause must know 
the consequence of his perfect creation ; and knowing 
the cause and the effects thereof, as perfect Providence, 
and working from a perfect motive, for a perfect pur- 
pose, with perfect material and by perfect means, he 
must so arrange all tilings, that the material shall be 
capable of ultimate welfare ; and must use means pro- 
portionate to the nature and adequate to the purpose. 
So the quantity of human oscillation with all the con- 
sequences thereof must of course be perfectly known to 
God before the creation as well as after the special 
events come to pass ; for to God contingents of caprice 
and consequents of necessity must be equally clear, 
both before and after the event. Little boys, under a 
capricious schoolmaster, learn the constants of his 
angers ebb or flow : 

O ' 

" Full well the boding tremblers learn to trace 
The day's disaster in his morning face." 

And do you think the infinite God is astonished at 
revolutions in Italy, or the discovery of ether ? because 
a hyaena, stealthily and at night, kills a girl in an Abys- 
sinian town, or a kidnapper, as stealthily and also by 
night, destroys a man in Boston ? The hyaena crouch- 
ing in his den. the kidnapper lurking in his office, are 
both known to God. 

Though human caprice and freedom be a contingent 
force, yet God knows human caprice when he makes it, 
knows exactly the amount of that contingent force, all 
its actions, movements, and history, and what it will 
bring about. And as he is an infinitely wise, just, and 
loving Cause and Providence, so there can be no abso- 

15 



170 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



lute evil or imperfection in the world of man, more than 
in the world of matter, or in God himself. 

So much for this Theism as a Theory of the World 
of Man as a Whole, in its most general form. 

Now see the concrete application thereof in the Gen- 
eral Human Life — in the life of nations. In creating 
mankind God must have known there would come the 
great races of men, — Ethiopian, Malay, Tartar, Amer- 
ican, Caucasian. He must have known there would 
come such families of the Caucasian as the Slavic, 
Classic, Celtic, Teutonic; such stocks of the Teutonic 
as the Scandinavian, the German, the Saxon ; of the 
Saxon such nations as England and America; in their 
history such events as the American Revolution, the 
Mexican War, and the like. I mean that God as per- 
fect Cause must have perfectly known all these things 
from eternity as well as now. History is a surprise to 
us, not to God. The breaking out of the Mexican 
War, the capture of Mexico, the failure or success of a 
general, might be an astonishment to men ; God was 
not wiser afterwards than before. As perfect Cause 
and Providence, he must have arranged all things so 
that mankind as a whole shall attain that bliss which 
his perfect motive and perfect purpose require, which is 
indispensable to his perfect material and his perfect 
means. All the powers and consequent actions, move- 
ments, and history of mankind must therefore have 
been known and provided for. The savage, the bar- 
barous, the half-civilized, and the civilized — the feudal 
and commercial periods, — and others yet in store, 
must have been known and provided for. The whole 
religious history of man, Atheism, Fetichism, Polythe- 
ism, Monotheism, — the Monotheism of the Hebrews 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



171 



and of the Christians, — must have been known. The 
rise, decline, and fall, of Egypt, India, Persia, Judea, 
Greece, Rome, and Byzantium, must have been as well 
understood by God at creation as now ; and as perfect 
Providence he must have provided for the rise, decline, 
and fall, thereof, so that they should be steps forward, 
towards ultimate bliss, and not from it. He must have 
given man his power of freewill as all other powers, 
from a perfect motive, for a perfect purpose, of perfect 
material, and as perfect means ; and of course it must 
achieve that purpose for mankind as a whole, for those 
great races, — Ethiopian, Malay, Tartar, American, 
Caucasian ; for those families, — Slavic, Classic, Celtic, 
Teutonic ; for those tribes, — Scandinavian, German, 
Saxon ; for every nation, — England, America. The 
great events of their history, — the American Revo- 
lution, the Mexican "War, — and every other, must 
be so overruled and balanced that they shall not 
contribute to the achievement of the purpose of God. 
And what is true of the whole must be true of each ; 
God must be perfect Providence for one as well as 
for another, and so arrange these that they all shall 
come to ultimate bliss. 

Therefore as you look on the sad aspect of the world 
at present, — on Italy, ridden by the Pope and priest ; 
on Austria, Hungary, Germany, the spark of freedom 
trodden out by the imperial or royal hoof ; on France, 
crashed by her own armies at the command of a cun- 
ning voluptuary ; on Ireland, trodden down by the cap- 
italists of Britain ; on the American slave, manacled by 
State and Church, —you know, first, that God foresaw 
all this at the creation, as a consequence of the forces 
which he put into human nature ; next, you know that 
he provides for it all, so that it shall not interfere with 



172 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



the ultimate bliss of the Italian, Pope-ridclen and priest- 
ridden ; of the Austrian, Hungarian, German, from 
whose heart the imperial or royal hoof has trod the 
spark of liberty ; of the Frenchman, the victim of a 
voluptuous tyrant : of the Irishman, trodden down by 
the British capitalist ; and of the American slave, fet- 
tered by the American Church and manacled by the 
American State. God made the world in such a man- 
ner that these partial evils would take place ; and they 
take place with his infinite knowledge, and under his 
infinite Providence. So when we see these evils, we 
know that though immense they are partial evils com- 
pensated by constants somewhere, and provided for in 
the infinite engineering of God, so that they shall be 
the cause of some ultimate good. For mankind has a 
Right to be perfectly created ; each race, family, tribe, 
nation, has a Right to be created from perfect motives 
for a perfect purpose, of perfect material, and with the 
means to achieve that purpose ; not at the time, when 
Russia and Montenegro will, or when you and I will, 
but when infinite wisdom, justice, love, knows that it 
is best. And sad as the world looks, God knew it all, 
provided for it all ; and its welfare, its ultimate triumph 
is insured at the office of the Infinite God. His hand 
is indorsed on each race, each family, each tribe, each 
nation of mankind. You cannot suppose — as writers 
of the Old Testament do — that the affairs of the 
world look desperate to God, and he repents having 
made mankind, or any fraction of the human race. 

See this Theism in its application to Individual Hu- 
man Life ; your fife and mine. God is perfect Cause 
and perfect Providence for me and you. Before the 
creation he knew every thing that I shall do, every 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



173 



thing that I shall suffer, every thing tnat I shall be ; 
provided for it all, so that absolute bliss must be the 
welfare of each of us at last. The evils — that is, the 
suffering in mind, body, and estate, the imperfect bliss, 
my failing to attain the outward or inward condition of 
this welfare, — these must come either from my nature, 
my human nature as man, my individual nature as the 
son of John and Hannah ; or from my circumstances 
that are about me ; or, as a third thing, from the joint 
action of these two. 

God as perfect Cause must have known my nature, 
my circumstances, the effect of their joint action ; as 
perfect Providence, he must have arranged things so 
that nature and circumstances shall work out for me, 
and for everybody, all this ultimate bliss which the per- 
fect motive can desire as a perfect purpose, which per- 
fect materials can achieve as perfect means. My 
individual suffering, error, sin, must have been equally 
foreseen, fore-cared for, and used in the great house- 
keeping of the Eternal Mother as a means to accom- 
plish the purpose of ultimate welfare. 

This must be true of Jesus of Nazareth crucified, 
and of Judas Iscariot who betrayed him to the cross ; 
of the St. Domingo hero who rotted in his dungeon, 
and of Napoleon the Great, who locked his dungeon 
door — himself one day to be jailed on a rock, with 
Ocean mounting guard over this Prometheus of his- 
toric times ; of theistic John Huss who blazed in his 
fire, and of the Twenty-third John, the perjured pope 
of Rome, who lit that fire five hundred miles from 
home. 

As at the creation of the world of matter God knew 
where the solar system would be in space, where the 
molecules of carbon which form the tie that binds my 

15* 



174 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



sermon together, would be on this seventeenth of Octo- 
ber, eighteen hundred and fifty-two years after the 
cradling of Jesus of Nazareth : — as He arranged the 
universe so that the solar system and these molecules of 
carbon should harmonize together, — as he knew of the 
rise, decline, and fall of states, and arranged all these 
things so as to harmonize with the march of man to- 
wards greater bliss ; — so he must have known where 
this little atom of spirit which I call Me would be this 
day, — what thoughts, feelings, will, and suffering I 
should have, and he must make all these harmonize 
with my march towards that ultimate bliss, which my 
finite human nature needs to take, and which his 
infinite divine nature needs to give. 

God is responsible for his own creation, his world of 
matter, and his world of man ; for mankind in general : 
for you and me. God's work is all warranted. Each 
man has a right to perfect creation, — creation from 
perfect motives, of perfect material, as perfect means 
for a perfect purpose. God has no other purpose, no 
other means, no other material, no other motive. He is 
the infinite power, wisdom, justice, love, and is security 
for the ultimate welfare of the sparrow that falls ; for 
mankind groping its dim and perilous way : for you and 
me darkly feeling our way along, often falling into pain, 
want, misery, and sin. God as Cause, and God as 
Providence has still means to bring us back and lead 
us home. I have a natural, unalienable Right to the 
Providence of the Lifinite God ; this Providence is the 
Duty of God, inseparable from his Infinity. If I am 
sure that God is infinite, then all else that is good I am 
sure of, for every thing which God makes is stamped by 
his hand with an unalienable Right to Him as infinite 
Cause and infinite Providence. 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



175 



As God was present at the creation of matter and of 
mankind, present with all his infinite perfection, and 
active therewith, — so is he present and active with me 
to-day with all his infinite perfections ; then as Cause, 
so now as Providence. And do you think the universe 
will fail of its purpose with Infinite God as its Provi- 
dence and its Cause ? Do you think any nation, any 
single human soul can ever fail of achieving this ulti- 
mate bliss, with Infinite God as its Cause and Infinite 
God as its Providence ? Why, so long as God is God 
it is impossible that his motive and purpose should 
fail to design good for all and each — or his material 
and means fail to achieve that ultimate good. 

Well, since these things are so, how beautiful appears 
the Material World ! There is no fortuitous concourse 
of atoms, which the atheist talks of; there is no uni- 
verse of selfishness, no grim despot who grinds the world 
under his heels and then spurns it off to hell, as the 
popular theology scares us withal. Every thing is a 
thought of Infinite God, and in studying the move- 
ments of the solar system, or the composition of an ul- 
timate cell arrested in a crystal, developed in a plant ; 
in tracing the grains of phosphorus in the brain of man ; 
or in studying the atoms which compose the fusil-oil in 
a drop of ether, or the powers and action thereof, — I 
am studying the Thought of the Infinite God. The 
Universe is his Scripture ; Nature the prose, and Man 
the poetry of God. The world is a volume holier than 
the Bible, old as creation. What history, what psalms, 
what prophecy therein ! what canticles of love to beast 
and man ! not the " Wisdom of Solomon " as in this 



176 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



Apocrypha, but the Wisdom of God, written out in the 
great Canon of the Universe. 

Then, when I see the suffering of animals, — the 
father-alligator eating up his sons and daughters, and 
the Mother-alligator seeking to keep them from his 
jaws, — when I see the sparrow falling at a dandy's 
shot, I know that these things have been provided for 
by the God of the alligator and the sparrow, and that 
the universe is lodged as collateral security to insure 
bliss to every sparrow that falls. 

From this point of view how beautiful appears the 
World of Man ! When I look on the whole history of 
man, — man as a savage, as a barbarian, as half-civil- 
ized, or as civilized, — feudal or commercial — fighting 
with all the forces which chemistry and mechanical 
science can offer, and suffering from want, war, igno- 
rance, from sin in all its thousand forms, — from des- 
potic oppression in Russia, democratic oppression in 
America ; when I see the tyranny of the feudal baron 
in other times, with his acres and his armies, of the 
feudal capitalist, now-a-days, — the commercial baron, 
with notes at cent per cent. ; when I see the hyaena of 
the desert stealing his prey in an Abyssinian town, and 
the hyaena of the city kidnapping a man in Boston, — 
when I see all this, I say the thing is not hopeless. O 
no! it is hopeful. God knew it all at the beginning, as 
perfect Cause ; cared for it all, as perfect Providence, 
with perfect motive, purpose, material, means — will 
achieve at last ultimate welfare for the oppressor and 
the oppressed. 

I see the individual suffering, from want, ignorance, 
and oppression ; the public woe which blackens the 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



177 



countenance of men, the sorrow which with private 
tooth gnaws the heart of African Ellen or William, the 
sin which puts out the eyes of Caucasian Cain or 
George. Can I fear ? O no ! though the worm of sor- 
row bore into my own heart, I cannot fear. The Infi- 
nite God with infinite power, wisdom, justice, holiness, 
and love, knew it all, and made the nature of Ellen and 
William, of Cain and George, and controls their cir- 
cumstances, so that by their action and the action of the 
world of man and the world of matter, the perfect mo- 
tive and the perfect means shall achieve the perfect pur- 
pose of the infinite loving-kindness of God. 

Then how grand is human destination! Ay, your 
destination and mine! There is no chance; it is di- 
rection which we did not see. There is no fate, but a 
Mother's Providence holding the universe in her lap, 
warming each soul with her own breath, and feeding it 
from her own bosom with everlasting life. 

In times past there is evil which I cannot understand ; 
in times present evil which I cannot solve ; suffering — 
for mankind, for each nation, for you and me ; suffer- 
ings, follies, sins. I know they were all foreseen by the 
infinite wisdom of God, all provided for by his infinite 
power and justice, and his infinite love shall bring us 
all to bliss, not a soul left behind, not a sparrow lost. 
The means I know not ; the end I am sure of. 

Whether I fly with angels, fall with dust, 
Thy hands made both, and I am there ; 

Thy power and love, my love and trust, 
Alake one place everywhere." 

In the world of matter there is the greatest economy 
of force. The rain-drop is wooed for a moment into 
bridal loveliness by some enamoured ray of light, then 



178 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



feeds the gardener's violet, or moves the grindstone in 
the farmer's mill, — serving alike the turn of Beauty 
and of Use. Nothing is in vain ; all things are mani- 
fold in use. 

" A rose, beside his beauty, is a cure." 

The ocean is but the chemist's sink which holds the 
rinsings of the world, and every thing washed off from 
earth was what the land needed to void, the sea to take. 
All things are twofold ; matter is doubly winged, wit h 
Use and Beauty. 

" Nothing hath got so far, 
But man hath caught and kept it as his prey ; 

His eves dismount the highest star; 

He is in little all the sphere. 
Herbs gladly cure our flesh, because that they 

Find their acquaintance there. 

" For us the winds do blow, 
The earth doth rest, heaven move, and fountains flow; 

Nothing we see but means our good, 

As our delight, or as our treasure ; 
The whole is either our cupboard of food, 

Or cabinet of pleasure. 

" The stars have us to bed ; 
Night draws the curtain, which the sun withdraws. 

Music and light attend our head: 

All things unto our flesh are kind 
In their descent and being; to our mind 

In their ascent and cause." 

And do you then believe that the great God, whose 
motto, " waste not, want not," is pictured and practised 
on earth and sea and sky, is prodigal of human suffering, 
human woe? Every tear-drop which sorrow has wrung 
from some poor negro's eye, every sigh, every prayer of 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



179 



grief, each groan the exile puts up in our own land, 
and the groan which the American exile puts up in 
Canada, — while his tears shed for his wife and child 
smarting in the tropics, are turned to ice before they 
touch the wintry ground, — has its function in the 
great chemistry of our Father's world. These things 
were known by God, and he will bring every exile, every 
wanderer in his arms, the great men not forgot, the little 
not less blest, and bear them rounding home from bale 
to bliss, to give to each the welfare which his nature 
needs to give and ours to take. 

The atheist looks out on a here without a Hereafter, 
a body without a Soul, a world without a Heaven, a 
universe with no God; and he must needs fold his 
arms in despair, and dwindle down into the material 
selfishness of a cold and sullen heart. The popular 
theologian looks out on the world and sees a body 
blasted by a Soul, a here undermined by a Hereafter of 
hell, arched over with a little paltry sounding-board of 
Heaven, whence the elect may look over the edge and 
rejoice in the writhings of the worms unpitied beneath 
their feet. He looks out and sees a grim and revenge- 
ful and evil God. Such is his sad whim. But the 
man with pure theism in his heart looks out on the 
world, and there is the Infinite God everywhere as per- 
fect Cause, everywhere as perfect Providence, transcend- 
ing all, yet immanent in each, with perfect power, wis- 
dom, justice, holiness, and love, securing perfect welfare 
unto each and all. 

On the shore of Time where Atheism sat in despair, 
and where Theology howled with delight, at its Dream 
of Hell all crowded with torment at the end, — there 
sits Theism. Before it passes on the stream of Human 
History, rolling its volumed waters gathered from all 



180 



SPECULATIVE THEISM. 



lands, — Ethiopian, Malay, Tartar, Caucasian, Amer- 
ican, — from each nation, tribe, and family of men ; 
and it comes from the Infinite God, its perfect Cause ; 
it rolls on its waters by the Infinite Providence, its per- 
fect Protector ; he knew at Creation the history of 
empires, these lesser dimples on the stream ; of Ellen 
and William, Cain and George, the bubbles on the 
water's face ; he provided for them all, so that not a 
dimple deepens and whirls away, not a bubble breaks, 
but the perfect Providence foresaw and fore-cared for it 
all. God is on the shore of the stream of Human His- 
tory, infinite power, wisdom, justice, love ; God is in 
the air over it, where floats the sparrow that fell, falling 
to its bliss, — in the waters, in every dimple, in each 
bubble, in each atom of every drop ; and at the end the 
stream falls into the sea, — that Amazon of human his- 
tory, under the line of Providence, on the Equator of 
the world, falls into the great Ocean of Eternity, and 
not a dimple that deepens and whirls away, not a bub- 
ble that breaks, not a single atom of a drop, is lost. All 
fall into the Ocean of Blessedness, which is the bosom 
of love, and then the rush of many waters sings out 
this psalm from human nature and from human his- 
tory, — " If God is for us, who can be against us ? '' 



SE11M0N VI. 

OF THEISM AS ETHICS. 

16 ( 181 ) 



PSALM XXV. 21. 

LET INTEGRITY AND UPRIGHTNESS PRESERVE ME, 

(182) 



s 



VI. 

OF PRACTICAL THEISM, REGARDED AS THE 
PRINCIPLE OF ETHICS. 



Last Sunday I spoke of Speculative Theism as a 
Theory of the Universe. To-day I ask your attention 
to a Sermon of Practical Theism ; of Theism consid- 
ered as a Principle of Ethics. 

You start with the Idea of God as Infinite in power, 
wisdom, justice, love, holiness ; you consider him in 
his relation to the universe, as perfect Cause and perfect 
Providence ; you see that from his nature he must have 
made the world, and all things therein, from a perfect 
motive, for a perfect purpose, of perfect material, as 
perfect means thereto ; and therefore that Human 
Nature must be adequate to the end which God de- 
signed ; that it must be provided with means adequate 
to the development of men; that all the faculties in 
their normal activity must be the natural means for 
achieving the purposes of God. You see that as he 
gave Nature, the material world, its present amount of 
necessitated forces, knowing exactly how to proportion 
the means to the end, the forces to the result which 
they were to produce ; — in like manner he gave to 

(183) 



% 



1&4 PRACTICAL THEISM. 

man his present amount of contingent forces, knowing 
perfectly well what use men would make thereof, what 
abuses would ensue, what results would come to pass, 
and ordered and balanced these things, compensating 
one constant by another, caprice by necessity, so that 
our human forces should become the means of achiev- 
ing his divine purpose, and the freewill of men should 
ultimately work in the same line with the infinite per- 
fection of God, and so the result which God designed 
should be achieved by human freedom : therefore, that 
this perfect Cause and perfect Providence has provided 
human freedom as part of the perfect means whereby 
human destination is to be wrought out ; — which des- 
tination is not fate, but providence. 

Well, this Idea of God, the consequent idea of the 
Universe and of the Relation between the two, cannot 
remain merely a theory ; it will affect human life in all 
its most important details. 

It will appear in the Form of Religion. Man must 
always work with such intellectual apparatus — facul- 
ties and ideas — as he has. With the Idea of the In- 
finite God, he must progressively construct 'a form of 
religion corresponding to that idea. That form of 
religion will comprise the subjective worship, and the 
objective service of God; and so it will become the 
Theoretic Ideal of Human Life. 

Then that form of religion will appear in the Actual 
Life of men, and in all the modes and modifications 
thereof : — for no human force is so subtle as the relisf- 
ious ; it extends, and multiplies, and goes into every 
department of human affairs ; 



" Spreads undivided, operates unspent." 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



185 



Let us now look at the theoretic Form of relig- 
ion which belongs to this idea, and at the Realization 
thereof in human life. Treating of a theme so vast I 
must pass over much which I would gladly say, and 
only briefly touch where I would fain pause long and 
dwell 

L Fust, then, of the Form of Religion. Of Relig- 
ion there are always two parts; namely, the subjective 
portion, which is Piety, consisting of emotions that are 
purely internal ; and next the objective portion, which 
is Morality, internal in part, and external also ; rooted 
in our consciousness of God, and branched abroad into 
practical action in our houses and farms and shops, our 
warehouses, our libraries, and our banks. Let me 
speak of each of these, going over things very much at 
large, in the sketchiest way. 

First of the subjective portion. "When fully grown 
this subjective part must be pure Piety ; I mean to say 
piety not mixed with any other emotion. 

There will be no Fear or Distrust of God, because it 
is known that there is nothing in him to fear : I fear 
what hurts ; never what helps. 

Distrust of God rests on the idea that he is something 
not perfect ; imperfect in power, wisdom, justice, love, 
or holiness : and with that idea of him God may seem 
good so far as he goes ; but not going inhnitely, he does 
not go far enough to warrant mnnite trust.; and so there 
is a partial distrust. 

Fear of God is worse yet. That rests on the suppo- 
sition that there is not only in God something not per- 
fect, but that there is hi him something which is not 
good, not kind. 

But you cannot fear infinite Love ; you cannot fear 

16* 



183 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



infinite Justice, nor infinite Holiness ; nor yet infinite 
Wisdom and infinite Power, when they are directed by 
infinite justice and animate with infinite love. With 
the idea of God as infinitely perfect I may indeed have 
doubts of to-morrow, doubts of my own or another's 
temporary welfare, for I know not what result the con- 
tingent forces of human freedom will produce to-morrow : 
but I can have no doubt of eternity, no doubts of my 
own or another's ultimate welfare, because I do know 
that the absolute forces of God will so control the con- 
ditional and contingent forces of men which his plan 
arranged and provided for, that ultimately the perfect 
purpose of God shall be achieved for all and each. A 
silversmith makes a watch, knowing the powers and 
consequent necessitated action of the materials he puts 
therein, so that it will keep time corresponding with the 
dial of the heavens. But he does not know how the 
purchasers of the watch will use it, whether or no they 
will fulfil the conditions essential to its action; and so 
he cannot absolutely foretell and provide for all its ac- 
tion and history; it will be subject to conditions which 
he cannot control or even foresee. Now the Infinite 
God, at the creation of man, knew all the powers He 
put therein ; he knew all the conditions into which the 
necessitated forces of material nature, and the contin- 
gent forces of human nature, shall bring mankind and 
fiach special person. Accordingly God absolutely 
knows not only the primitive powers of each man, but 
the action, movements, and complete history thereof 
under any and all the conditions of existence. And the 
Infinite God working with motives proportionate to his 
nature, and means adequate to his purpose, must needs 
make man capable of achieving that ultimate welfare 
which the finite needs to have and the Infinite needs to 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



187 



give. If God be infinite, a perfect Cause and perfect 
Providence, this conclusion follows as plain as the 
farmer's road to mill. So I say I can have no distrust 
and no fear of God ; no fear of ultimate failure or future 
torment. Suffering I may have in another life : I will 
meet it gladly, and thank God ; it is medical, and not 
malicious. In the popular theology God is represented 
as a Jesuitical Inquisitor ; but the Infinite God is a 
protector, a Father and Mother. 

Then there will be Absolute Love of God, — to the 
mind God will be the Beauty of Truth ; to the con- 
science the Beauty of Justice, to the affections the 
Beauty of Love, to the soul the Beauty of Holiness, and 
to the whole consciousness of man he will appear as 
the total Infinite Beauty ; the perfect and absolute ob- 
ject of every hungering faculty of man ; the Cause that 
creates from perfect love as motive, for perfect love as 
purpose, and by perfect love as means ; the perfect 
Providence that provides from the same motive for the 
same purpose, and by the same means. So he will ap- 
pear as the Father and the Mother of all ; operating by 
necessitated forces in the dew-drop, and in the all of 
material things ; operating, also, by contingent forces in 
the soul of a little girl, or in the great aggregate of 
spirit which we call the world of man ; operating so 
perfectly as Cause and so perfectly as Providence that 
he is Father and Mother to every soul. I say this Idea 
of God is infinitely lovely, and awakens in the heart of 
a man, who draws near thereto, the deepest and tender- 
est love. There is no doubt, no fear. 

With this Idea of God, and this Love of Him, there 
comes a Perfect Trust in God, as Cause and Provi- 
dence : — not only a trust in the daylight of science, 
where we see, but in the twilight, even in the darkness 



188 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



of ignorance, where we see not : — an absolute trust in 
his motive, his purpose, and his means ; so that we 
shall not desire any other motive but the motive of God, 
nor any other purpose but the purpose of God, nor any 
other means but the means he has provided thereto. 

With that trust there must come a perpetual Hcpe, 
for yourself, for all mankind ; for as dark as the world 
may be, dark as my own condition may be, my outward 
lot, my inward state, still I know assuredly that God 
foresaw it all, provided for it all, and that he cannot 
fail in motive, in purpose, or means thereto ; and thus 
light will spring out of darkness and bliss come forth 
out of bale. 

With this there will come Tranquillity and Rest for 
the soul ; that Peace spoken of in the fourth canonical 
Gospel, which the world cannot give nor take away. 

Then there will come a real Joy in God. I mean the 
happiness which the Mystics call the " sense of sweet- 
ness " that comes when the conditions of the soul are 
completely met; when the true Idea of God and the 
appropriate Feeling towards him furnish the personal, 
human, inward condition of religious delight, and there 
is nothing between us and the Infinite Father. That is 
the highest joy and the highest delight of human con- 
sciousness. The natural desires of the body may fail 
of satisfaction, — their hunger shortening my days on 
earth, — and I may be poor and cold and naked ; I may 
be a prisoner in a dungeon of Austria, or a slave on a 
plantation of Carolina ; I may be sick and feeble, and 
the conditions of domestic and of social welfare may 
not be complied with; — but if the soul's conditions 
are fairly met within on the side that is turned towards 
the Infinite, then through the clouds the Beauty of God 
shines on me and I am at peace. 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



189 



So there will come a Beauty of Soul, 1 mean a har- 
monious spiritual whole of well-proportioned spiritual 
parts, and there will be a continual and constant growth 
in all the noble qualities of man. God will not be 
thought afar off, separated from Nature, separated from 
man, but dwelling therein, immanent in each, though 
yet transcending all. Nature will be seen as a revelation 
of God; and the march of man will reveal also the same 
Providence, as the world of matter — human conscious- 
ness disclosing higher characteristics of the Infinite 
God. Communion with him will be direct, my spirit 
meeting his, with nothing betwixt me and the Godhead 
of God. I shall not pray by attorney, but face to face. 
Inspiration will be a fact now, not merely a history of 
times gone by. Worship, the subjective service of God, 
will be not by conventional forms of belief, of speech,, 
or of posture ; not by a sacramental addition of an 
excrescence where nature suffered no lack, nor by muti- 
lation of the body, or mutilation of the spirit, the sac- 
ramental cutting off where God made nothing redun- 
dant : but by conscious noble emotions shall I subjec- 
tively worship God ; by gratitude for my right to the 
Father, and in his universe the thanksgiving of an up- 
right heart; by aspiration after a higher ideal of my 
own daily life ; by the sense of Duty to be done, which; 
comes with the sense of Right to be enjoyed ; by peni- 
tence where I fall short ; by resolutions, that in my 
" proper motion," I may ascend, and not by adverse fall 
come down ; by the calm joy of the soul, its delight in 
Nature, in Man, and in God ; by the hope, the faith, and 
the love, which the large soul sends out of itself in its 
religious life ; and by the growing beauty of character, 
which constantly increases in love of wisdom, in love 
of justice, in love of benevolence — in love of Man, 



190 PRACTICAL THEISM. 

in love of God. That will be the real worship, the 
internal service of the Father. 

So much for the subjective part of this form of 
religion. 

Of the Objective Part also a word. God, who is 
thus subjectively served in the natural forms of Piety, 
must be objectively served or worshipped in the natural 
forms of Morality ; that is, by keeping all the laws of 
God. In Nature, the material world, the law of God 
is the actual constant mode of operation of the forces 
thereof, — the way it does not act. There all is neces- 
sitated, and we know of the law by seeing the fact that 
it is always kept ; for the ideal law of matter is the 
actual fact of matter, learned by observation, not by 
consciousness. So the material universe and God, in 
every point of space and time are continually at one. 
If law is a constant of God, obedience thereto is a con- 
stant of matter. But in man, the law of God for man 
is the ideal constant mode of operation of the human 
force, — the way it should act. This is not always a 
fact in any man ; and we learn it not merely by ob- 
servation of our history, but by consciousness of our 
nature. Morality is the making of the ideal of human 
nature into the actual of human history. Herein the 
ideal of God's purpose becomes the actual of man's 
achievement; and so far man and God aie at one, as 
everywhere God and matter are at one. Then for every 
point of Right we seek to enjoy, there is a point of 
Duty which we will to do. 

Thus in general, morality will be the objective ser- 
vice of God, as piety is the subjective worship of God. 
These two make up the whole of Religion. They are 
the only "divine service:" Piety is the great inward 



PEACTICAL THEISM. 



191 



sacrament and act of worship ; Morality the great out- 
ward sacrament and act of service — other things are 
but helps. Piety will be free piety, such as the spirit 
of man demands : Morality will be free morality, such 
as the spirit of man demands ; both perfectly conform- 
able to the nature which God put into man, to the body 
and the spirit, — the mind and conscience, heart and 
soul. 

This morality will consist partly in keeping the Law 
of the Body; in giving it its due use, development, 
enjoyment, and discipline, in the world of matter. 

The popular theology, in its ascetic rules, goes to an 
extreme, and does great injustice. It counts the body 
mean, calls it vile, says that therein dwells no good 
thing. It mortifies the flesh, crucifies the affections 
thereof. But the body is not vile. Did not the infinite 
Father make it, — not a limb too much, not a passion 
too many ? God make any thing vile ! and least of all 
this, which is the consummation of his outward work- 
manship, — the frame of man ! Far from us be the 
thought. 

The Atheistic philosophy goes to the other extreme, 
and clamors for the " rehabilitation of the flesh," and 
would have a paradise of the senses, as the sole and 
earthly heaven of man. Theology turns the flesh out 
of doors, and the soul has cold housekeeping, living 
alone ; Atheism turns the soul out of doors, and the 
flesh has no better time of it ; no, has a worse time, 
with its scarlet women " tinging the pavement with 
proud wine too good for the tables of pontiffs." Abso- 
lute Religion demands the use of every limb of the body, 
every faculty of the soul, all after their own kind, each 
performing its proper function in the housekeeping of 
man. Then there will be freedom of the body, freedom 



192 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



for every limb to perform its function, and to perform 
no more. That is the morality of the body. 

This morality will consist also in keeping the Law 
of the Spirit ; that is, in giving the spirit its natural 
empire over the material part of us. and in giving each 
spiritual faculty its natural place in the housekeeping of 
the spirit ; so that each, the intellectual, the moral, the 
affectional, and the purely religious faculty, shall have 
its due development, use, enjoyment, and discipline in 
life. Then there will be spiritual freedom ; that is, the 
liberty of every spiritual faculty to perform its own 
work, and no more. This is the morality of the 
spirit. 

The popular Theology restrains each spiritual faculty. 
It hedges you in with the limitation of some great or 
little man : it calls a man's fence the limit to God's 
revelation : it does not give the mind room, nor con- 
science room, nor the affections room, nor yet the soul 
sufficient space to serve God, each by its natural func- 
tion. 

One of the good things of Atheism has been this : it 
offers freedom to the human spirit. That is its only 
good, and its only charm. In a Church of the Popular 
Theology the great mind cannot draw a long breath, 
lest it should wake up the u wrath of God," — which, 
we are told, never sleeps very sound, nor long at a time. 
In the free air of Atheism the largest mind is told to 
breathe as deep as he can, and make as much noise as 
he will; there is no God to molest and make him 
afraid. That is the only charm which Atheism ever 
had to any man. It raises men from fear, and it bids 
them be true to that part of their nature which they 
know. 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



193 



"Well, such will be the form of Religion coming from 
Theism ; such its Piety and Morality. You see it will 
be a form of religion which fits well upon the finite 
side, — on man ; for it is derived from his nature, and 
represents all parts thereof, doing justice to the body, to 
its every limb, to ail its senses, functions, passions ; 
doing justice to the spirit, every faculty thereof, intellec- 
tual, moral, affectional, and religious. It fits just as 
well on the infinite side — on God ; for it is drawn 
from human nature on the supposition that God made 
human nature from perfect motives, of perfect material, 
for a perfect purpose, and as a perfect means thereto. 
This form of religion, then, is the application of God's 
means to the purpose of God. 

As " Christian " Theology professes to be derived 
from a verbal revelation of God, — represented by the 
Church, as the Catholics say, by the Scriptures as the 
Protestants teach, — so the Absolute Religion is derived 
from the real revelation of God, which is contained in 
the universe ; this outward universe of matter, this 
inward universe of man ; and I take it we do not re- 
quire the learned and conscientious labors of a Lardner, 
a Paley, or a Norton, to convince us that the universe is 
genuine and authentic, and is the work of God without 
interpolation ; we all know that. I call this the Abso- 
lute Religion, because it is drawn from the absolute 
and ultimate source ; because it gives us the absolute 
Idea of God, — God as Infinite ; and because it guar- 
antees to man his natural rights, and demands the per- 
formance of the absolute duties of human nature. 

So much for this Form of Religion in itself. 



II. Now see how this Form of Religion will ap- 
17 



194 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



pear in the Actual Life of Man, and the subjective 
religious thought become an objective religious thing. 

See it first in the form of Individual Human Life ; 
in a Person. 

He will be the most religious man who most con- 
forms to his nature ; who has most of this natural piety 
and of this natural morality. There will be various 
degrees thereof, only one kind. He will worship God 
the best, or subjectively serve him, who has the most 
love of truth, the most love of justice, of benevolence, 
of holiness ; the greatest love of Man, and the greatest 
love of God ; who most desires and strongest wills to 
possess these great qualities ; in short, he who has the 
most natural piety. 

He will serve God the best, objectively worship him, 
who has the most of truth, of righteousness, of friend- 
ship, of philanthropy, of holiness — fidelity to himself; 
he who best uses the great or the little talent and op- 
portunity which God has given ; in a word, he who 
has the most Morality. He will be the most completely 
religious man who most keeps the law of God, for his 
body and for his soul ; and of course who coordinates 
the flesh and the spirit, and duly subordinates the low 
qualities of the spirit to the higher ; — for a very little 
activity of the higher faculties of man is worth a great 
deal of activity of the lower ; even as an ounce of gold 
can any day purchase some tons of sand. 

This it seems to me, is the true scale of man's spirit- 
ual faculties : — Intellect is the lowest of them, dealing 
with truth, use, and beauty in their abstract and con- 
crete forms ; next comes Conscience, aiming at justice 
and eternal right ; next the Affections, loving persons, 
and sacrificing my personal joy to the delight of another 



PEACTICAL THEISM. 



195 



person ; and highest of all comes the religious faculty, 
which I call the Soul, that seeks the infinite Being, 
Father and Mother of the Universe, and loves him with 
perfect love and serves him with perfect trust. So in 
the individual the soul, taking cognizance of the infi- 
nite being, and his Relation to us, is thereby our natu- 
ral master. Is not this true which I state ? It is not 
merely my psychological knowledge of man which tells 
me this ; it is the world's history which tells it ; it is the 
consciousness of your heart, and my heart, which cry 
out for the living God, and assure us that we must sub- 
ordinate every thing to him. 

What a difference there will be between the saint 
of Absolute Religion and the saint of the popular The- 
ology. The real saint is a man who aims to have a 
whole body, and a whole mind, and a whole conscience, 
and a whole heart, and a whole soul ; and to live a 
whole, brave, manly life, at work in the daily calling of 
grocer, or mason, or legislator, or cabinet-maker, or his- 
torian, or seamstress, or preacher, or farmer, or king, 
or whatsoever it may be : that will be the aim of the 
saint of natural religion. But the popular saint is an ex- 
ceedingly different thing ; a meagre, church-rid mope, 
" a-dust and thin," a ghost of humanity that haunts the 
aisles of the church ; for the popular saint is dyspeptic 
in body, dyspeptic in mind and conscience, in heart and 
soul : you see by his face that his spiritual digestion is 
poor, his stomach is weak, and his religion does not agree 
with him. He must send off to the Jordan to get water 
to christen his baby, before that baby is thought safe from 
the damnation of hell ; baptism with the spirit of God 
and the spirit of Man is not enough. But the real saint 
of absolute religion must be a free spiritual individual. 
His Piety must represent him, and his Morality must 



I 



196 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



represent him, and he will carry them both into all his 
work. Knowing that God gave him faculties as God 
meant him to have them, each containing its law in itself ; 
knowing that God provided them as a perfect means 
for a perfect purpose, and that that purpose is one which 
cannot fail, — he will use these faculties in the true ser- 
vice of God ; and he will work as no other man, — with 
a strength, and a vigor, and a perseverance ; ay, and a 
beauty of character too, which nothing but Absolute 
Religion can ever give. So there will be the greatest 
strength to do, to be, and to suffer, sure to conquer at 
the last. He will sail the more carefully, for he knows 
that careful sailing is the service which God requires 
of him ; he will sail the more confident, because he 
knows that his voyage is laid out, and his craft is in- 
sured by the Power who holds the waters in the hollow 
of his hand; yes, that it is insured against ultimate 
shipwreck at the great office of the infinite God. Will 
he not work therefore with greater earnestness and zeal 
because he knows that God gave him these talents as 
perfect means for a perfect end ; with more confidence 
because he knows the end is made sure of ; and with 
more caution, because he knows that the true use of the 
means is the only service God asks of him ? 

See this same thing in its Domestic Form, — that of 
Human Life in the Family. The family must repre- 
sent the tree spiritual individuality of man and woman, 
regarded as equal, and equally joining by connubial love 
— passion and affection — for mutual self-denial and 
mutual delight ; — for ihere is no marriage without mu- 
tual self-denial as means, for mutual delight as end. 
Marriage between a perfect man and a perfect woman, 
would be mutual surrender and mutual sacrifice. 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 197 

In all forms of religion that I know, from the book of 
Moses to the book of Mormon, from Confucius to 
Calvin, woman is degraded before man ; for in all forms 
of religion hitherto Force has been preferred above all 
things, and the great quality which has been ascribed 
to God is an Omnipotence of Force. That is the thing 
which Christendom has worshipped these many hun- 
dred years, not love ; a mighty head, a mighty arm, not 
a mighty heart. As force is preferred before all things 
in God, so in man ; hence in religion ; thence in all 
human affairs. And as woman has less force than man, 
less force of muscle, less force of mind, has more fineness 
of body, superior fineness of intellect, has eminence of 
conscience, eminence of affection, eminence of the relig- 
ious power, eminence of soul ; as she is inferior to man in 
his lower elements, and superior in his higher, — so she 
has been prostrated before him. Her Right of nature 
has been trodden underfoot by his Might of nature. 
This degradation of woman is obvious in all forms of 
religion ; it is terribly apparent in the Christian Church. 
The first three Gospels, — the last is an exception — the 
writings of Paul and Peter, the book of Revelation, 
have small respect for woman, little regard for marriage. 
The Bible makes woman the inferior of man ; his in- 
strument of comfort, his medium of posterity ; created 
as an after-thought, for an " helpmeet " to man, because 
" it was not good for man to be alone." Marriage in 
the New Testament — in the first three Gospels at least 
— is only for time : " in the kingdom of Heaven they 
neither marry nor are given in marriage." It is a low 
condition here ; celibacy is the better of the two ; " it is 
not good to marry ; " — only " all men cannot receive 
this saying." The Christ was represented as born with 
no human father, — his very birth a fling at wedlock. 

17* 



198 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



The Christian Church has long taught that marriage 
was a little unholy ; and woman was bid to be ashamed 
of that part of her nature which made her a daughter 
first, and afterwards a wife and mother. What do 
Jerome, Augustine, and Aquinas, and the Popes say of 
connubial love ? They have Paul as warrant for their 
unnatural creed. All this depreciation of woman comes 
from the idea of a God with whom might is more than 
right ; the idea of a God that is mighty in his head, in 
his outstretched arm, but is feeble in his conscience, and 
feeble in his heart ; a most unmotherly God. 

But the Absolute Religion will give woman her true 
place in the family, as the equivalent of man ; and 
when the family is of two free spiritual individualities, 
grouped together by mutual love, for mutual self-denial 
and mutual delight, then we shall have a family relig- 
ion such as the world never saw before. And that 
will not be deemed the most religious family, which has 
the most of psalm-singing and of prayers, — excellent 
things, I deny not, — but that wherein every law of the 
body and every law of the spirit are most completely 
kept ; where man is joined to woman, and woman joined 
to man in passional and afTectional love, with mutual 
sacrifice and mutual surrender ; the wedlock of equals, 
not the huddling together of a superior and an inferior. 

See this in its Social Form, — that of Human Life 
in Communities. All men will be regarded as equal in 
nature, equal in rights, equally entitled to take a just 
and natural delight in the world of matter, on the same 
just and natural conditions which God has laid down. 
The Absolute Religion of the individual must be " pro- 
fessed " in the institutions of society, and be made life 
in the world of men. Then Morality will take the form 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



199 



of Industry in all its million modes ; of Natural Enjoy- 
ment of the products of industry ; of Justice, regulating 
the intercourse of men by the golden rule, which is alike 
the standard measure in the mind of Man and in the 
mind of God ; the form of Friendship with a few, from 
whom we ask delight in return for the joy we give ; the 
form of Philanthropy to all, asking no return. Industry 
will be deemed a divine service ; and a man's shop, 
library, bank, office, warehouse, farm, his station in 
church or state, — all will be deemed the special temple 
wherein he is to worship the Father by natural Mo- 
rality, — service with every limb of his body, every 
faculty of his spirit, every power over matter or man 
which he has gained. Friendship, with its mutual 
triumph and reciprocal surrender, Philanthropy, which 
comes as charity to palliate the effects of ill, or as justice 
to remove the cause of ill, — these will be deemed the 
noble factors in the religion of society, to work out " a 
far more exceeding, even an eternal weight of glory." 
Then the tools of a man's work, the farmer's plough, 
the mason's trowel, the griddle of the cook, the needle 
of the seamstress, and the scholar's pen, will be reckoned 
the consecrated vessels of our divine service, and of 
man's daily communion with man. 

There will be a Church, doubtless, for gathering the 
multitudes from the cold air, to warm their faces where 
one great man lights the fire with sentiments and ideas 
which he has caught from God. There will be a Sab- 
bath for rest, for thought, for ideas, for sentiments; 
hours of self-communion, of penitence, of weeping ; 
aspirations, hours of highest communion and life with 
God ; but the whole world will be a temple, every spot 
holy ground, every bush burning with the Infinite, all 
time the Lord's day, and every moral act worship and 



200 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



a sacrament. Then men will see that voluntary idle- 
ness is a sin ; that profligacy is a sin ; that deceit is a 
sin ; that fraud in work and in trade is a sin ; that no 
orthodoxy of belief, no multitude of prayers, no bodily 
presence in a meeting-house, no acceptance of an arti- 
ficial sacrament, can ever atone for neglect of the great 
natural sacrament which God demands of every man. 

Will not that be a change in society ? Now, the 
man of the popular theology sneaks into Church on the 
first day of the week, and hopes thereby to atone for an 
abnegation of God on the other six ; communes with 
God through bread and wine, and refuses to commune 
with him in buying and selling; is a liar, a usurer, a 
kidnapper before men, while he professes to be a saint 
before God. What is taught to him as "revealed relig- 
ion," does not rebuke his pride, nor correct his con- 
duct. 

Then, with the teaching of the true Absolute Relig- 
ion, it will be seen that the great man is only the great 
Servant of Mankind. He that is powerful by money, 
office, culture, genius, owes mankind an eminence of 
industry, justice, and love, as pay to God for the oppor- 
tunities, the station, the strength, which he has received. 
God gave him greatness by nature ; society gave him 
greatness of culture, of wealth, of station ; — Why ? 
That he might do the more service, not take the more 
ease. The man of genius is born to be eyes for the 
public. If he looks out only for himself he has denied 
the faith, and is an Infidel. 

Then it will be seen that the true function of the 
powerful class, — men strong by Money, wherein New 
England is so rich, men strong by Culture, whereof 
New England is even now so poor — is to do mankind 
an eminent service ; to protect the needy, the defenceless, 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



201 



the ignorant, and the wretched. Riches are valuable as 
they fertilize the soil for human excellence to grow on, 
not for some lazy weed to rise and rot. If wealth im- 
poverish him that gets, or those from whom it was won, 
there is a twofold curse, blasting him that takes, and 
those who aid therein. If superior culture only shuts 
out the scholar from common men, he had better have 
spent his years in a coal pit than a college. True re- 
ligion, true manhood, teaches that if you receive genius 
and talent from God, or culture at the cost of men — 
you owe the use of all to men, to the poor, the ignorant, 
the feeble-minded. Science is moral when it opens the 
eyes of the blind, and teaches the foolish to understand 
wisdom ; Wealth is pious when it helps Charity palliate 
the ills she cannot cure, and aids Justice to extirpate 
the wrongs which curse mankind ; Strength is religious 
when it bears the burdens of the weak. 

When the knowledge of the infinite God is spread 
abroad in Society, social honors will not be given to 
a man for the accident of famous birth, or merely for 
gathered gold ; not for the station to which some human 
chance has blown the man ; not for his culture of intel- 
lect alone, nor for the dear gift of genius which God 
gave him at his birth ; but for the use he makes of his 
native gifts or labored acquisitions ; for his faithfulness 
to himself, to man, and God; for his justice, his love, 
and his piety, shown by the use of one talent or ten. 

There will always be diversities in natural powers 
and in the use thereof, and so diversities of culture, of 
property, of social station and social power. God is 
democratic and loves all, but the odds between the 
natural gifts of John and James may be greater than 
the difference betwixt the plains of Lombardy and the 
Alps which look down thereon. Men may try to forget 



202 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



this fact ; America may put little, mean men with me- 
diocrity of intellect, into her president's chair ; may put 
little mean men with ordinary mind and with feeble 
conscience, with inferior affections and a paltry soul, 
into their pulpits ; but God still goes on creating his 
great masterly men, with immense intellect and com- 
mensurate moral, affectional, and religious powers, 
who while they come to bless, perforce, must overawe 
and terrify the littleness which burrows in state and 
church ; men who receive the earliest salutation of new- 
rising truth, and shed it down, reflecting from far up 
the Higher Law's intolerable day on president and 
priest. Alas, great minds have hitherto been commonly 
the tyrants of the times, oppressors in the state, and worse 
oppressors in the church : and humble men believed 
that God was only Might, not also Right and Love ; 
so they paid a base and servile homage to the great 
oppressor, and trod down justice, mercy, love, in their 
haste to kneel before a Pope or King : Jesus of Naza- 
reth is still exceptional in the world's long life ; Napo- 
leon is instantial. But if selfish popes and kings are 
common history, the self-denying Christ is prophecy of 
what one day shall be. For as God made the moun- 
tains stony, huge, and tall, that they, screening the vale 
below, might wrestle with the storm, and clothe their 
shoulders with ice and snow — garments woven for 
them and carefully put on by each wayfaring cloud, — 
and therewith robe the plains beneath in green and 
vari-colored dress ; so has he made great, mountainous- 
minded men as forts of defence for all the rest, and 
treasuries of help. Great men shall not always misuse 
their five talents, nor little men hide their one piece of 
the Lord's small money in the ground ; mankind long 
stumbling will one day learn to walk. 



PEACTICAL THEISM. 



203 



Then men will see that that is the most religious 
community where, proportionately, the most pains is 
taken to secure the welfare of all, to speed Genius on 
its triumphant way, to help the poor, the feeble, men 
of imperfect body and imperfect brain, and those sad 
wrecks of circumstance we now pile up in jails to 
moulder and to rot. A Steeple and a Gallows will not 
always be the signs significant of a Christian land. Men 
will not measure the religion of society by the number 
of the temples and priests, but by the colleges and 
school-houses, the hospitals, the asylums for the old, 
the sick, the deaf, the blind, the foolish, the crazy, and 
the criminal ; nay, they will measure it by the honest 
Industry in business ; by Truth in science ; by Beauty 
in literature ; by Justice in the state ; by the Comfort, 
the Health, the Manhood of the men. 

Look at this in its Ecclesiastical form, that of Human 
Life in Churches. Men will combine about some able 
man for these three purposes — to kindle their religious 
Feelings by social communion ; to learn the true Idea 
of God, of Man, and of the Relation between the two, 
the idea of duty to be done and rights to be possessed ; 
to make the idea a Fact, so that what at first was but 
subjective feeling, then a thought, shall next be trans- 
lated into deed, done into Men, Families, Communities, 
States, and a World, and so the Ideal of God become 
the Achievement of Mankind. 

Then the function of the Church will be to keep 
all the old which is good, and get all possible good 
which is new. No creed, no history, or Bible shall 
interpose a cloud betwixt Man and God ; reverence for 
Moses, Jesus, or Mohammed shall be no more a stone 
between our eyes and truth, but a glass telescopic, 



204 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



microscopic, to bring the thought of God yet nearer to 
our heart. The Bible's letter shall no longer kill ; but 
the spirit which "touched Isaiah's hallowed lips with 
fire," and flamed in the life of a Nazarene Carpenter 
till its light shone round the world, will dwell also in 
many a new-born soul. No man shall be master, to 
rule with authority over our necks ; but whoso can 
teach shall be our friend and guide to help us on the 
heavenly road. 

Then the minister must be a man selected for his 
human power, — for his power of mind, of conscience, 
and of heart and soul; with well-born genius if we can 
find it, with well-developed talents at the least. His 
function will be to help awaken the feeling of Piety in 
all men's hearts ; to bring to light the ideas of Absolute 
Religion which human nature travails with, longing to 
bear ; and to make the inward worship, also, outward 
act. He must help apply this idea to life. Negatively 
— this will be criticism, exposure of the false, the ugly, 
and the wrong, the painful part of preaching, the sur- 
gery of the church. Positively — it will be creation, 
making application of religion to the individual, the 
family, community, state, and world. So the minister 
will not aim to appease an offended God, grim, re- 
vengeful, and full of paltry resentment ; nor to commu- 
nicate a purchased salvation from the fabled torments 
of hell ; nor to add the imputed righteousness of a good 
man to help us to an unreal heaven. But with the 
consciousness of God in his heart, with the certain 
knowledge of (rod's infinite perfection, sure of the per- 
fect motive, purpose, means of God and conscious of 
eternal life, he is to preach the natural laws of man. 
He is to lead in science, if it be possible, — in physics, 
ethics, metaphysics ; to lead in justice, applying its ab- 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



205 



stract laws to concrete life — not to hinder them by in- 
stitutions, or by books, by the Vedas, the Koran, or the 
Testament ; to lead in love, connubial, friendly, philan- 
thropic ; ay, to lead in holiness, — the subjective service 
of God which is worship in spirit and in truth, the ob- 
jective worship, which is service by the normal use, de- 
velopment, and enjoyment of every limb of the body, 
every faculty of the spirit, every power acquired over 
matter or man. He will be more anxious to understand 
truth, beauty, and justice, to have love and faith ; more 
anxious to communicate these to man, and organize 
them into individual, domestic, social, national, human 
life, than to baptize men in water from the Jordan, 
the Ganges, or the Irrawaddy. He will be accounted 
the most valuable minister who most helps forward 
the highest development of mankind ; and that will be 
held as the most religious Church whose members live 
the manliest life of the body and the spirit — with the 
most of normal use, development, and enjoyment of all 
their nature, — do the most of human duty, enjoy the 
most of human rights, and so have the most and the 
manliest delight in themselves, in Nature, in Man and 
God. 

See this religion in the Political Form, that of Human 
Life in Nations. Here the aim will be to take the 
Constitution of the Universe for the foundation of po- 
litical institutions, making absolute Justice the standard 
measure in all political affairs, and redacting the 
Higher Law of God into all the statutes of the people's 
code. Men of Genius, in all its many modes, will be 
the nation's telescopic eye to discover the Eternal Right. 
The highest thought of the most gifted and best cul- 
tured men will become the ideal which the nation seeks 

18 



206 



PKACTICAL THEISM. 



to incorporate in its code, to administer in its courts, 
and revive in its daily life. That will be thought the 
most religious nation whose institutions, constitutions, 
statutes, and decisions, conform the most to abstract 
right, applying this to its action abroad and at home ; 
where the whole people are the best and the best 
off; and the higher law of God is carried out in the ac- 
tion of the nation with other states, of the government 
with the people, of class with class, and of man with 
man. As proofs of the national religion you will bring 
forward the character of the people — their conduct 
abroad and at home, their institutions and their men. 

This religion must take a Cosmic, or General Human 
Form, in the Life of Mankind. It will unite all nations 
into one great bond of brotherhood. As the members 
and various faculties of Thomas or Edward are con- 
joined in a man, with personal unity for all, but indi- 
vidual freedom for each ; as several persons are joined 
together in a family, with domestic unity for all, but 
individual freedom for each ; as the families form a 
community, and the communities a state, with social 
and national unity of action, but yet with domestic and 
social individuality of action ; so the nations of the 
world will join together, all working with cosmic human 
unity of action, but each having its own national indi- 
viduality of action. This would realize the dim ideal 
of Pagan Zeno — who counted men, " not as Athenians 
and Persians, but as joint-tenants of a common field to 
be tilled for the advantage of all and each," — and of 
Christian Paul — who taught that the God whom the 
Athenians ignorantly worshipped " made of one blood 
all nations of men." 

Then law would be justice, loyalty righteousness, and 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



207 



patriotism humanity. Men conscious of the same 
human nature, and consciously serving the infinite God, 
must needs find their religion transcending the bounds 
of their Family, Community, Church and Nation, and 
reaching out to every human soul. But hitherto forms 
of religion have been a wedge to sever men, and not a 
tie to bind. The popular theologies of the world in this 
life aim to separate the " Christian " from the " Heathen," 
the Protestant from the Catholic, the Unitarian from the 
Trinitarian, the new school from the old school ; and in 
the next life, the " reprobate " from the " elect," the sin- 
ner from the saint. 

On the last five Sundays, I have spoken of Atheism' 
and of the Popular Theology. I hope I did no injus- 
tice to Atheism, none to the Atheist. It is a sad ; 
thought, his world without a God ; his here, but no 1 
Hereafter ; his body, and no Soul. I hope I did him 
no injustice. One thing he surely has that the popular 
theologian has not : he has Freedom ; freedom from 
fear, freedom to use his faculties. This freedom will 
last forever. But the theory of the atheist abuts in 
selfishness, and in darkness his little light goes out. 

I hope I did no injustice to the Popular Theology. 
It is grim, it is awful. It bears great truths in its 
bosom, and those truths will last forever ; but the popu- 
lar theology as a system must fall. It rests on two 
columns. 

One is the Idea of an Angry God, imperfect in wis- 
dom, in power, in justice, love, and holiness ; a finite, 
and jealous, and revengeful God ; creating man from 
mean motives, for a mean purpose, and of a mean- 
material, — God with a hell under his feet, " paved 



208 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



with skulls of infants not a span long," and swarming 
full of horrid, writhing life, that chokes it to the brim. 

The other pillar is the Idea of a Supernatural Christ, 
a God and yet a man, with a supernatural birth, super- 
natural works, resurrection, and ascension — a super- 
natural atoning sacrifice to take away the sins of the 
world. These are the Jachin and Boaz of this the- 
ology. 

Philosophy strikes down the first column, and there 
is no angry God, no infinite hell " paved with skulls of 
infants not a span long," and full of horrid, writhing 
life ; and so Theology swings in the air at one end. 

Criticism strikes away the other pillar, the super- 
natural Christ : there is no supernatural Christ, a God 
and yet a man, with a supernatural birth, supernatural 
works, resurrection, ascension, — an atoning sacrifice to 
take away the sins of the world. And so Theology 
swings in the air at the other end. It lacks a philo- 
sophical basis and historical foundation ; false in its 
idea, and false also in its historic fact. 

The scientific atheist mocks at the God of the popu- 
lar theology. Lalande says, I have looked far off 
through my telescope, and there is no God betwixt me 
and the furthest star, for I have seen all the way 
through. Ehrenberg, with his microscope, finds a mil- 
lion million of creatures in a single cubic inch of polish- 
ing slate from Germany; but he finds no theological 
God therein. The chemist analyzes the materials of 
the world into their elements, and he finds oxygen, car- 
bon, and the rest, but he finds no theologic God therein. 
The scientific atheist mocks at the Church's God. 

The popular idea of God is inadequate for Science ; 
ay, yet worse, it is inadequate for Philanthropy ; for the 
philanthropist loves the poor, the beggar, loves the 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



209 



Indian, the slave, the outcast, the atheist, and the 
criminal ; and Theology says " The slave is the pos- 
terity of Ham, whom God cursed by Noah and spurned 
from his feet ; and sinners are to have an everlasting 
hell in the world to come." The atheists turn off with 
scorn from the theologic idea of a God who knows less 
than Alphonso of Castile ; and the philanthropist, with 
a tear, turns from the damning deity of the popular 
Church. 

Hence comes the position of Religion to-day. Look 
at Boston: how small is the Church and how poor; 
how big is the tavern and how rich ! Why, the keeper 
of the tavern in Boston is more influential than " the 
minister of Christ : " the consecrated preacher in his 
pulpit trembles before Felix in his bar. The Holy 
Ghost of the Church, with the other two persons of 
the Trinity, yields to the Spirit of the T.avern ; there is 
" no room for them in the inn ; " happy if they can find 
a manger with the oxen, and a swaddling garment for 
their new-born piety in the cattle's crib. Look at Bos- 
ton, with its hundred clergymen, — religion is no re- 
straint in business, no restraint in politics ; not at all ; 
and in our literature of mediocrity, — that is the only 
literature which America yet possesses — religion is a 
force infinitesimally small, and not felt. It dares not 
speak against drunkenness and prostitution ; it is dumb 
religion, and dares not even oppose the stealing of men 
out of their houses in this town. The minister's " king- 
dom is not of this world ; " no, verily, it belongs to a 
world that is dead and gone. Respectable gentlemen 
do not ask Morality in a lawyer ; they expect it not in 
a politician ; they ask it of the minister. God be 
thanked, they do ask some little of it there. But it is 
only moral decency, — compliance with easy-mannered 

18* 



210 PRACTICAL THEISM. 

virtue, not the morality of a Paul whose spirit was 
stirred in him when he saw the city wholly given to 
idolatry ; no, it is only the Ephesian morality of Deme- 
trius ! But a lawyer whose life is corrupt, who is un- 
scrupulous and unprincipled, or a politician who is rotten, 
will not find that he is less trusted by the great cities 
of this country. Tell men that slavery is wicked ; that 
to play the pirate in Cuba is sin, — what do they say ? 
They quote the constitution. "Politics is national 
housekeeping, not national morality," say they. " Talk 
of the Higher Law, do you? You are a fanatic! We 
disposed of that long ago." 

I say the Popular Theology is not a " finality," — to 
use the language of the day. It is doomed to perish. 
Let me do it no injustice. Mankind is very serious ; a 
very honest mankind ; and its great works are done 
with sweat and watching and sore travail. Down on 
its knees went mankind to pray for this theology ; and 
we have it. With many faults it has great truths. The 
truths will never perish ; they will last while God is 
God. Even its faults have done mankind no small 
service. War has taught us activity, and discipline of 
body and mind ; has helped the organization of men ; 
shown the power of thousands when molten to a single 
mass, and wielded by a single will. But the popular 
theology has taught greater things than that : it has 
shown the omnipotent obligation of Duty ; to sacrifice 
every thing for God — the body and the spirit, the in- 
tellect, with its pride of reasoning, the conscience with 
its righteousness; the affections, with their love of 
father and mother and wife and child. The warrior 
all stained with blood and sweating with his lust, it 
taught to subordinate the flesh to the spirit, to scorn 
the joys of the sense, to practise self-denial of ease and 



PKACTICAL THEISM. 



211 



honor and health and riches and life, for the good that 
is purely spiritual. This is the lesson which ascetic 
Protestantism has so grimly taught to you and me, and 
ascetic Catholicism to the Christian world. The monks 
and nuns, the martyrs of the Inquisition, the saints who 
went hungry and naked and cold ; the infidels and 
atheists who turned off from all religion frighted by 
this bugbear of the Church ; the dreadful doubts and 
fears and madness and despair of the w orld, — these are 
the tuition fees which mankind has paid for this great 
lesson. 

Let this theology pass. Science hates it. Every 
Cyrena from the London clay - — a leaf gathered from 
the Book of God now newly unfolded from the flinty 
keeping of a pebble on a subterranean beach, myriads 
of years older than Moses — confutes Moses and turns 
the popular Theology upside down. Philanthropy hates 
it; hates its jealous God, its narrow love, its pitiless 
torment, and its bottomless and hopeless hell. Let it 
pass. It can do little for us now ; little for the mind 
and the conscience of the world ; nothing for the affec- 
tions, nothing for the soul. It can only drive men by 
fear, not charm by love. Let it pass ; and its minis- 
ters tremble before the bank, the shop, and the tavern. 
Let the churchling crouch down before the worldling 
if he will. 

But will Atheism aid us any more ? It will do noth- 
ing, cheer nothing. It has only this to perform,- — to 
rid men of fear and bondage to ancient creeds. It 
never was a spring of action, and never can be. No ! 
We must root into the soil of God, else we perish for 
lack of earth. An earth without a Heaven, a here 
with no Hereafter, a body without a Soul, and a world 
without a God- — will that content the science and 



212 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



satisfy the philosophy of these times ? Fill your mouth 
with the east wind! Atheism can never teach man 
that solemn, beautiful word, — I ought; only / must, 
which is Fatalism ; or / will, which is Libertinism ; 
never I ought, which is the mark of perfect obedience, 
and perfect freedom too. Atheism knows not the word 
Duty which marries Might with Right. 

Well, shall we be without religion, — this Caucasian 
race, which has outgrown the worship of Nature, Poly- 
theism, the Hebrew form of faith, classic Deism, and is 
fast outgrowing this popular Theology ? I smile at 
the dreadful thought. Shall the great forces of modern 
civilization be wielded only for material ends ? Here is 
America, a young nation, yet giant strong, with twenty 
million souls all cradled in her lap ; and three million 
souls spurned as dust beneath her cruel feet. She has 
set her heart on this continent, " I will have all this 
goodly land," quoth she. She has set her affections on 
money, vulgar fame, and power. Every mountain gives 
us coal, iron, lead, water for our mill; California de- 
lights to tempt us with her gold. And America, speak- 
ing with the new and brazen trumpet of the State, says, 
" There is no Higher Law forbidding me to plunder 
Spain and Mexico, or crush the Black as I slew the 
Red." Says America, through the other trumpet, the 
old and brazen trumpet of the Church, " There is no 
Higher Law ! Plunder and crush ! " 

Is that to be so ? Is modern civilization, with 
science that formulates the heavens and reads the 
hieroglyphics of the sky, with mechanical skill which 
surpasses all the dreams of faery, — modern civilization, 
with such riches, such material power, such science, such 
physics, ethics, metaphysics, with Berlins of scientific 
lore, with London, Paris, and New York, affluent with 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



213 



energy — is this to be an irreligious civilization ; genius 
without justice, riches without love, organization for 
the strong, the rich, and the noble-born, an organization 
to oppress, a civilization without God ? No ! You say- 
no, and I say no ; human history says no ; human 
nature says no! 

What shall hinder? The popular Theology? The 
usurer, the politician, the kidnapper, in their selfishness, 
laugh at your Old and New Testament, and spurn 
at your hell. The Christian churches are on the side 
of sin ; oppression is favored by them the old world 
through, and oppression is favored by them the new 
world through. " Renounce the world ! " says the 
priest, and means " Renounce the Higher Law of God." 
Soon as sin is popular the church christens it, and re- 
annexes the sin to itself. Did the American Church 
do aught against the Mexican war ? Will it do aught 
against the Cuban war ? It will put Cuban gold into 
its treasury to evangelize the heathen. What does it 
do against the awful sin of America at this day ? It 
has strengthened the arm of the oppressor ; it has 
riveted chains on the bondman's neck. But just now 
— thanks to the Almighty God ! — the churches of 
New England and the West, met in solemn convoca- 
tion at Albany, have protested against this mighty sin ; 
and have charged their clergymen who went to those 
corners of the land where the sin is practised, to bear 
their testimony against it ; and if men would not hear 
them, then to depart out of their city. This is the first 
time ; and it marks the turning of the tide which ere- 
long will leave this old theology all high and dry upon 
the sand, a Tadmor in the desert. 

The religion which we want must be of another 
stamp. It must recognize the Infinite God, who is not 



214 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



to be feared, but loved ; not God who thunders out of 
Sinai in miraculous wrath, but who shines out of the 
sun on evil and on good, in never-ending love. It must 
respect the universe, matter, and man ; and worship 
God by natural Piety and serve Him with the Morality 
of nature. 

Then what a force Religion will be ! There will be 
a religion for the body, to serve God with every limb 
thereof; a religion for the intellect, and we shall hear 
no more of " atheistic science," but Lalande shall find 
God all the world through, in every scintillation of the 
furthest star he looks at, and Ehrenberg confront the 
Infinite in each animated dot or cell of life his glass 
brings out to light ; yea, the chemist will meet the 
Omnipresent in every atom of every gas. Then there 
shall be a religion for Conscience, the great Justice ; a 
religion for the Affections, the great Love ; a religion 
for the Soul, perfect Absolute Trust in God, Joy in God, 
Delight in this Father and Mother too. 

Then what Men shall we have ! not dwarfed and 
crippled, but giant men, Christlike as Christ. What 
Families ! woman emancipated and lifted up. What 
Communities ! a society without a slave, without a 
pauper ; society without ignorance, wealth without 
crime. What Churches ! Think of the eight and 
twenty thousand Protestant churches of America, with 
their eight and twenty thousand Protestant ministers, 
with a free press, and a free pulpit, and think of their 
influence if every man of them believed in the Infinite 
God, and taught that the service of God was by natural 
Piety within and natural Morality without ; that- there 
was no such thing as imputed righteousness, or salva- 
tion by Christ ; but that real righteousness was honored 
before God, and salvation by character, by effort, by 



PRACTICAL THEISM. 



215 



prayer, and by toil, was the work ! Then what a nation 
should we have ! ay, what a world ! 

We shall have it; it is in your heart and in my heart; 
for God, when he put this idea into human nature, 
meant that it should only go before the fact, — the 
John the Baptist that heralds the coming of the great 
Messiah. 

" Eternal Truth shines on o'er errors' cloud, 

Which from our darkness hides the living light ; 

Wherefore, when the true Bard hath sung aloud 
His soul-song to the unreceptive night, 
His words, like fiery arrows must alight, 

Or soon, or late, and kindle through the earth, 

Till Falsehood from his lair be frighted forth. 

" Work on, oh fainting Heart, speak out thy Truth ; 

Somewhere thy winged heart-seeds will be blown, 
And be a grove of Pines ; from mouth to mouth, 

O'er oceans, into speech and lands unknown, 

E'en till the long-foreseen result be grown 
To ripeness, filled like fruit, with other seed, 
Which Time shall plant anew, and gather when men need." 



SERMON VII. 

OF IMMORTAL LIFE. 

19 ( 217 ) 



1 CORINTHIANS XV. 49. 

WE SHALL ALSO BEAR THE IMAGE OF THE HEAVENLY. 

(218) 



VII. 



OF THE FUNCTION AND INFLUENCE OF THE IDEA 
OF IMMORTAL LIFE. 



I ask your attention this morning to a sermon of the 
true Function and legitimate Influence of the Idea of 
Immortality. The subject is most intimately connected 
with the Theism lately spoken of. 

The boy stolen from his mother by wolves in Hin- 
dostan, and brought up by them with their own young, 
becomes like a wolf. He seems to have no thought 
except for the day ; his motives are gathered only from 
his present wants ; no more. He satisfies his animal 
appetites, and then sleeps. Behold the sum of his con- 
sciousness ! He knows no past, cares for no future, and 
has nothing within him which checks any instinctive 
desire. There is man reduced to his lowest terms, 
living from the lowest motives, animal selfishness ; for 
the lowest ends, animal existence, brute enjoyment ; by 
the lowest means, the instinct of brute desire. In that 
case human nature is as poor as it can live. 

The cultivated citizen of Boston extends his thought 
in the present, to all the corners of the earth, takes in 
all the countries of the globe ; the doings in Europe 

(219) 



220 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



and in Asia affect his daily consciousness. He em- 
braces the stars of heaven ; his telescopic thought 
sweeps the horizon of the universe. The discovery of 
a new planet is a joy to him,, though his eye shall never 
taste its light. He connects himself with the past ; he 
remembers his father and his mother, loving to trace 
his branch of the family-tree far down, — now to a 
New England sachem, now to a Norman king, or till 
it touches the ground in some Teutonic savage three 
thousand years ago. He loves to follow its roots under- 
ground to Noah, or Adam, or Deucalion, or Thoth, or 
some other imaginary character in the Heathen or 
Hebrew mythology. Thus he enlarges his present con- 
sciousness by recollecting or imagining the past, and is 
richer for every step he takes in history or fantasy. Not 
satisfied with this, he reaches forth to the future, with 
one hand building genealogies and tombs for his grand- 
sires, and with the other houses for his grandchildren. 

Thus our cultivated man enlarges his consciousness 
by the thought of men that are about him, behind him, 
and before him ; all of these lay their hands, as it were, 
upon his shoulders, to magnetize him with their man- 
hood, present, past, or to come ; for as there is a long 
train of men, our brothers, reaching out from you and 
me to the furthest verge of the green earth, so there is 
another long train, six hundred or six thousand genera- 
tions deep, standing behind us, each laying its hands 
on its forerunner's shoulders, and all communicating 
their blood and then civilization unto us who inherit 
the result of their bodily and spiritual toil. 

It is a delight thus to extend our personality in 
Space, by knowledge of matter and man, and control 
over both ; and in Time, by our connection with the 
family, reaching both ways, by our relation to the 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



221 



human race, in its indefinite extent backwards and 
around us on either hand. Human motives are gather- 
ed from the whole range of human consciousness and 
human knowledge, and our inward life is enlarged and 
enriched by the sweep of our intellect. 

So the daily life of a civilized man in Boston comes 
to be consciously influenced by his wider knowledge of 
the present, by his acquaintance with the past, by his 
anticipations of the future. This man is checked from 
wrong and encouraged to good, by the character of his 
acquaintances about him ; some men by recollecting 
their father and their mother, whose names we would 
not sully with our daily sin. Almost every parent is 
animated by the desire to bless his children in genera- 
tions that are to come. Thus the generations are 
bound together, and the personality of John and Jane 
in actual history is carried back to the first man, and 
in fancy is carried forward to the last. A grandfather 
in the house, a baby in the cradle, a mother at hand or 
afar off in the hills of Berkshire, remembering us in her 
evening prayer, — each of these is a hostage for the 
good conduct of mortal men. This young man will 
not dice or drink lest he wound the bosom which bore 
him. That young woman denies herself for her child, 
forbears the enormities of life lest she should poison the 
blood in the veins of one not yet born, or now drinking 
life from her breast. The wider is the circle of human 
observation, without or within, the more plenteous is 
the harvest of motive and delight gleaned up there- 
from. 

But men go further than that, and extend their in- 
dividuality beyond the grave. The belief in the future 
life is at first a dim sentiment, an instinctive feeling, 
then a conscious desire, a dreaming of immortality; 

19* 



222 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



then the hope and fear thereof ; and at last it is a cer- 
tain confidence in eternal life, an absolute delight in 
immortality. 

Thus successively the human landscape widens out 
from the wolf's den of that savage boy till it takes in 
family, neighborhood, nation, mankind, all ages past 
on earth, all generations yet to come ; yes, till our 
horizon of consciousness in its sweep includes God and 
Eternity. 

There is a God of Lifinite Perfection: the Soul of 
each man is destined to Eternal Life. These are the 
two greatest truths which human consciousness as yet 
has ever entertained. They are the most important; 
and if the human treasures of thought were to go to 
the ground and perish, all save what some few men 
grasped in their hands and fled off with, escaping from 
a new deluge, should clutch these two truths as the 
most priceless treasure which the human race had won, 
and journey off with them to pitch my tent anew, and 
with these treasures build up a fresh and glorious civil- 
ization. When a man is influenced by hope and fear 
for the Future World, he is a higher being, much 
higher, than when this life was the limit to his thought. 

But the influence of the Idea of Immortality has by 
no means proved an unmixed good. It has brought 
much evil on the world. It has been connected with 
the idea that God was malignant ; and then the pros- 
pect of future life has been the culprit's anticipation of 
trial, torture, and damnation without end. Men have 
believed that the other side of the grave the Devil 
waited, armed with his torments, to seize poor Dives, 
who had his " good things in this life," and in the next 
stage make him smart for the purple and fine linen he 
wore in this. So the consciousness of immortality has 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



223 



often clouded over the future life with fear. Thus 
there is a popular ballad of the Middle Ages which de- 
scribes a boy suffering bereavement, disease, poverty, 
and many a grief ; and he says, 

" I would fain lie down and die, 
But for the curse of immortality." 

I have heard ministers preach whose notions of the 
future life were of the grimmest sort, — so that with 
their belief, I would not have sent a rat or a mouse be- 
yond the grave ; nor wished my worst enemy to cross 
over, — and yet they said the common notion of im- 
mortal life was " too good to be true ! " It was too bad 
to be true. I knew it was so bad that God would blot 
it out as a contradiction which could not be, and would 
never allow it to be a divine fact, only a human folly, 
which those men dreamed of. 

In virtue of this fear, the belief in immortality has 
secured to the priesthood an immense amount of power, 
and excessive dominion over mankind ; an authority 
wellnigh irresponsible, and which has led to great 
cruelty on their part. The priest taught men, " It is a 
terrible thing to fall into the hands of the living God. 
He is angry with the wicked every day, and keeps his 
anger forever." " Alas," groaned the believer, " what 
shall I do to be saved ? " Then the priest replied, " J, 
and I alone, can appease the wrath of God. O selfish 
Baron Rackrent, full of sin, and waiting to die, give me 
thy money, give the Church thy broad lands, or else 
forever suffer and rot in hell ! " And the Baron, ex- 
tending his selfishness beyond the tomb, frightened at 
the picture of the " Last Judgment " painted on the 
walls of the Church, or the " Dance of Death " sculp- 
tured in the graveyard, where Death and the Devil 



224 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



waltz and saraband mankind to Hell, gave to the priests 
the riches which they set their celibate hearts upon, and 
robbed his own heirs of many a fair rood of upland 
and of meadow under the influence of this fear and 
of the priesthood who fanned its dreadful flame. 

The thought of immortality has turned men away 
from natural Piety and natural Morality. The priest 
declared, " That will do very well to live with, it is good 
for nothing to die by." So this belief, thus distorted, 
has led to unnatural modes of life ; has crushed the de- 
light out of many a heart, and has hindered the human 
race in their progress. Even now the fear of death and 
of torment sicklies over the countenance of men when 
their mortal hour draws nigh ; tears, alarm, and whim- 
pering and snivelling on a death-bed, are commonly 
thought by ecclesiastical persons to be better evidence 
of religion in the heart than a life forty or fifty years 
long, adorned every day by the beauty of holiness 
within and the beauty of righteousness without. 

All these evils come from the idea that God is ma- 
lignant and loves to torture the children of men; and 
that idea itself has come from the infancy of mankind, 
and like other poor follies is one day to be outgrown 
and left behind us with the childish things of our boy- 
hood. 

These evils continue at the present day; for God, 
though called a Father, is commonly thought a tyrant. 
So his government of this world is represented as a ty- 
rannical despotism, and his Heavenly Kingdom is com- 
monly painted so that it is the last thing which one 
would think of with pleasure. I never saw a picture of 
the " Last Judgment," which did not make me shiver 
with horror at the thought that any man could be so sav- 
age as to paint it. I never read a " Judgment Hymn " 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



225 



in a Psalmbook, from Origen of Alexandria to Lyman 
Beecher of Boston, — even Luther's, modified by three 
hundred years of civilization since his death — which 
was not fit to make a man's blood curdle in his veins. 
Only one sect has taught the doctrine of immortality in 
such a guise that any man need wish it to be true — 
the Universalists ; and that sect is only a small fraction 
of the Christian world. If the common notions of eter- 
nal life were true, then we ought to call it Eternal 
Death ; immortality would be the greatest curse God 
coald inflict upon mankind. It is too bad to be true. 
Annihilation would be better : — 

" Feelingly sweet were stillness after storm, 
Though under covert of the wormy ground." 

In the popular mythology, God is represented as 
turning Adam and Eve out of Paradise, with bitter 
execrations, — " Cursed is the ground for thy sake ; in 
sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life ; thorns 
also and thistles shall it brinsr forth to thee." Fortu- 
nately that part of the popular mythology was writ by 
a man who makes no mention of immortality. Prob- 
ably he had never heard of it. If he had he might have 
added that God knit his brows at mankind, baring his 
red right arm, and then said, " Eat also of the tree of 
life and live forever, and I will torture you for all eter- 
nity." The Hebrew writer probably had not heard of 
immortality ; he did not add that ; he left it for Chris- 
tian doctors to do. So in the popular theology the Fall 
was the first misfortune of mankind, and Immortality 
the last. To die bodily was looked upon as the first 
curse, but to be unable to die in the soul is looked upon: 
as the last curse. Read sermons — and they are of the 
commonest — on the fate of the wicked in the next life, 



226 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



and Ihey shall tell you, almost all of them, that the 
wicked, the reprobate, the damned, will call out for 
the hills to fall on us, on the mountains to cover us; 
and the remorseless hills will not stir; the unpitying 
mountains will not start an inch; man shall ask for 
annihilation and have Hell for answer. 

Yet spite of this horrible doom prepared for mankind, 
as it is alleged, which makes immortality a curse and 
the thought of it a mildew, — the doctrine is so dear to 
the human heart, to the reflective head of mankind, that 
it is clung to, loved, believed in, and cherished by the 
mass of men all over the world. Even the Churches' 
fabled hell cannot frighten mankind out of their love 
for eternal life, " This longing after immortality." 

" For who would lose 

Though full of pain, this intellectual being, 
These thoughts that wander through eternity ? " 

The doctrine of eternal life is always popular. If 
you were to poll the world to-day and get the ayes and 
noes of all mankind, nine hundred and ninety-nine out 
of every thousand would give their vote for immortality. 
Yet few have ever reasoned about it much, and demon- 
strated their immortality. Most men think that they 
take it on trust from the mouth of their priest, or from 
" revelation," — the Christians from the Bible, the 
Mahometans from the Koran. But it is not so ; we do 
not take it on trust from a man. Like what else comes 
from the primitive instincts of the human heart, we 
take it on trust from the Father; from no less au- 
thority. 

I mention these things to show first, how deep is the 
instinct of immortality in our heart, for all nations 
above the nakedness of the most savage have fastened 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



227 



their hopes on this ; they have dug down to this primi- 
tive rock, never very far from the surface ; and next to 
show how strong it is, which even the fear of the future 
eternal torment cannot annihilate. For sixteen or 
eighteen hundred years the Christian Church has 
preached the docrine of immortality in such a form that 
it is only another name for the wrath of God and eter- 
nal torment to the mass of men ; but with all this 
preaching it has not scared the belief thereof out of the 
heart of man, and it cannot. 

And yet dear as this doctrine is to the heart of man- 
kind, for many hundred years you find powerful men 
of great ability aiming to destroy the belief in it. 
These philosophers have had a bad name in human 
history because they denied what the heart of man 
loved to believe, what the analogy of Nature plainly 
taught, and what also the noblest philosophy proves 
as its very highest affirmation. It is a strange thing 
that men who have preached eternal damnation for the 
vast majority of mankind, have a good name in every 
Church, — St. Augustine, Gregory, — half a dozen of 
that name ; — St. Bernard, a mighty preacher of eternal 
ruin ; and in our own country, Edwards, Hopkins, and 
Emmons, among the most venerable names of our 
American Church. But on the other hand, men who 
have declared that God was too good to persecute his 
children beyond the tomb, — they have everywhere 
received a bad name. 

If a man denies the immortality of the soul, his oath 
is not allowed in the courts of Christendom. Even in 
Massachusetts he is an " outlaw," and can prove 
nothing in a Court of " Justice," except by the testi- 
mony of some " believer." His account-books are no 



228 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



" evidence " in court, his testimony of no value. But a 
man who teaches that the God of the Christians is a 
thousand times more cruel than any idol-deity of Scan- 
dinavia or Hindostan, who will "torture with tire and 
redhot plates of iron," all but ten in the million, has 
his oath allowed him in every court! 

But we ought to look at the reason which has led 
the philosophers to deny the doctrine. Some of them 
have doubtless been low and vulgar men, — as mean as 
their theological opponents, — and from lowness and 
vulgarity denied what their lowness and vulgarity hin- 
dered them from comprehending. But that is a very 
small class amongst philosophic men ; and it is a rare 
thing to find a low and vulgar man flying in the face 
of popular opinion for the sake of an idea. Such men 
preach the popular doctrine, not the opposite. But it is 
a fact of history that in old time, from Epicurus to 
Seneca, some of the ablest heads and best hearts of 
Greece and Rome sought to destroy the idea of immor- 
tality. This was the reason : they saw it was a torment 
to mankind, that the popular notion thereof was too 
bad to be true ; and so they took pains to break down 
the Heathen mythology, though with it they destroyed 
the notion of immortal life. They did a great service 
to mankind in ridding us from this yoke of fear. The 
Pagan philosopher and scoffer was a " forerunner " of 
Jesus, — quite as much so as John the Baptist, Be 
assured of this ; — it is a great thing to destroy an 
organized tyranny, even if at first you set up no govern- 
ment in its place ; for such is the creative power of the 
human spirit that, if it have a free chance to work, it 
will soon raise up new Homes out of the dust, and 
leaving the monarchies of the old continent will build 
up republics in the new. After you have hewn down 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



229 



the forest and driven off the catamount and the wolf, 
it is not a hard thing to raise corn and sheep in the 
new soil. 

But soon as Christianity became established in the 
State, the old tyranny of fear got set up anew ; and 
as the doctrine of immortality appeared in a more dis- 
tinct form and became more apparent in the Christian 
than in the Hebrew or Heathen Church, so this fear of 
future torment became more distinct and more power- 
ful ; yes, it became absolute. It was connected with 
the doctrine of the Fall ; with " foreordination by the 
divine decrees," which is the Fatalism of the Christian 
Church, — the same thing which had taken a form 
slightly different in the Greek and Roman theologies, 
and was again to appear, modified a little further, in 
the. Mahometan theology ; — with the idea of " total 
depravity," and the " infinite evil " of sin ; and in such 
bad company, what wonder is it that the doctrine of 
immortality became what it did become ? It was fear 
of God, not love of him. It was fear of future torment 
which brought down the knee and the neck of Christian 
Europe under its priestly tyrants. It was not love of 
God which built the costly domes of Italy, and the 
cathedrals of the North. No, it was fear of hell. An 
atheistic pope wished to build up a costly church in 
Rome. He wanted money, — he had rack-rented all 
Italy, — and so he sent round his apostles, first to 
preach the wrath of God, the torments of the future 
world; next that the priesthood had power to appease 
that wrath and abate those torments ; then, as a third 
thing, that they would do all this for money. Monk 
Tetzel went about to sell his indulgences, — pardons 
for sins past, present, and to come. He offered to ticket 
men all the way through to Heaven ; and they might 

20 



230 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



take any quantity of luggage of sin with them, by pay- 
ing a small additional fare. He had a drum beat ; and 
when men assembled he mounted his stand, opened his 
ticket-office and began hawking and peddling his eccle- 
siastical wares. Luther said, " I will make a hole in 
TetzePs drum ! " — So he did. " The pope," said 
Luther, " cannot save men from Purgatory ; his tickets 
will not be taken anywhere on the road. Keep your 
money and renounce your sin ! " The sale of indul- 
gences went down all at once ; the market stopped. 

But the tyranny of fear was not broken : there was 
only one mode less of escaping it. You could no 
longer buy off the wrath of God. There lay the bot- 
tomless pit, and there was none to ticket men across. 
Other men undertook to make a larger hole in that 
same drum ; to smite in both heads of it. They said, 
" The soul is not immortal : death is the end of you ! " 
These men labored to destroy the Christian mythology, 
just as the old scoffers and philosophers had sought to 
make way with the Heathen mythology. Did that 
denial satisfy the world ? Quite far from it. 

The Human Race is under great obligation to these 
deniers. These " atheists " have done mankind great 
service. Epicurus, Pyrrho, Lucretius, Bruno, Voltaire, 
Paine, Hume, are among the benefactors of the race. 
It is a great thing to destroy a superstition which rides 
men as a nightmare. But some of them were among 
the most miserable of all this earth's martyrs that I have 
ever read of. There they sat, surrounded by jollity and 
elegance, wine and scarlet women, the victims of cir- 
cumstances which they could not control. Their fate 
was far more pitiful than that of St. Sebastian or St. 
Catharine. Who would not rather be shot through and 
through with arrows, or broken for once on a wheel of 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



231 



iron and wood, than be shot at with doubts of immor- 
tality and broken constantly with dread of annihilation ? 
Believing men who build up a new religion are always 
harshly treated, scourged in the market, beaten, let down 
out of windows in the wall of the city, shipwrecked, 
persecuted, leaving then heads in a charger, or their 
bodies on a cross. They have our sympathy, and de- 
serve it, — brave souls in hardy iron flesh. But the un- 
believing men who broke down the old religions, and 
saw no other light in the dusky ruin they made, — they 
are sadder martyrs in the world's great story ! Drop a 
tear then on the grave of Voltaire, on the tomb of Pom- 
ponatius, and on the fires which consumed Jordano 
Bruno. You and I are made free by their sufferings ; 
by their sorrows are our joys made more certain. In a 
better age Voltaire might have been as devout and re- 
ligious as Gerson or Luther, and Bruno have been 
burned not as a heretic, but as a Christian. 

The work of theological destruction is not yet over ; 
far enough from it. The popular mythology must go 
the same way with the old Greek and Roman mythol- 
ogy, and other martyrs are doubtless demanded for that. 
No Emperor Julian, apostatizing from the progress of 
mankind, can save what is false, or destroy the true. 

The leading philosophers of Europe seem to have 
small faith in immortality ; some positively deny it ; a 
few mock at it. Many of the enlightened Germans, 
whom oppression drives to America, deny the immor- 
tality of the soul, some openly scoff at the hope of eter- 
nal life ; and say all belief therein is a misfortune, for it 
clouds over men's happiness now with fear of future 
torment, hinders their progress, and makes them believe 
that Virtue and Justice are not good for their own sake, 
but only as means to another end. There is a good 



232 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



deal of truth in their objections no doubt ; but they all 
apply only to a false idea of immortality and a wrong 
use of it ; not at all against the true doctrine itself. It 
seems to me these philosophers wholly overlook the 
deep desire of mankind for personal immortality ; — the 
natural belief which is so general that it is universal, ex- 
cept in those who have cultivated their intellect at the 
expense of the conscience, the affections, or the soul ; or 
in whom, in early life, some prejudice has hindered the 
natural instincts of mankind. They forget what a pow- 
erful motive to good it is, what a present enjoyment it 
affords to the human race ; and their denial, it seems to 
me, is most unphilosophic. And yet they are doing the 
same service now that Zeno and Lucretius and Lucian 
did for Christianity. They are the forerunners of some 
better " dispensation " that is to come. 

I know some men fear that these bold deniers of im- 
mortal life will destroy the belief of mankind therein. I 
have no fear of that. Spite of the Catholic Church, for 
sixteen hundred years preaching immortality as a curse, 
and the Protestant Church for three hundred years pro- 
claiming it as a mildew and blight, — men have still 
entertained the belief ; and if all the learned clergy of 
the Protestant world, if all the Catholic clergy of the 
dark ages, could not make any considerable number of 
men doubt of immortality, I do not believe that a hand- 
ful of philosophers speaking in the name of philosophy 
or mockery, can ever put down that which has held 
mankind so strongly for two or three thousand years. 
Immortality has kept the field against Augustine and 
Jerome, the Basils, the Gregories, and Bernard; has 
held its own spite of Aquinas and Calvin and Edwards 
and Hopkins and Emmons, and I think it can laugh at 
Strauss and Comte and Feuerbach. Has it not in its 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



233 



time heard devils roar, and yet held its own against the 
Hell of the Church ? Do you think, then, it has any 
thing to fear from the Earth of the material philosophers ? 

We know little of the next life ; nothing of the de- 
tails thereof. In all the accounts of the future world 
which are commonly thought by Christians and Ma- 
hometans to come from miraculous revelation, you see 
how poor is the invention of mankind : the basis of the 
future heaven is always human, earthly. The Mahom- 
etan heaven is only what the Mahometan wishes to 
make earth, a paradise of the senses ; all the passions, 
littleness, and vulgarity of the Mussulman are carried 
thither and repeated on a great scale. It was so in the 
Greek heaven ; in the heaven of the ancient Germans. 
The Book of Revelation in our Bible is the work of 
some bigoted Jew, apparently not at all improved by 
the Christianity of his time ; and its heaven is only a 
New Jerusalem, a most uncomfortable place for any- 
body but male and unmarried Jews. With the Puri- 
tans, Heaven was a New Plymouth or a New Boston, 
where the " Elect " had the monopoly which they 
wanted to get in the old Plymouth or old Boston, but 
could not quite accomplish ; where all the time was 
Sunday, and the chief business was going to meeting ; 
the chief joy was psalm-singing and listening to Cal- 
vinistic explanations of the Scripture, now and then de- 
lighting their eyes with the sight of their former oppo- 
nents writhing in the pains of damnation. It was the 
Puritans' earthly life, idealized a little, and made eter- 
nal; they hoped to see their enemy tortured in hell 
whom they could not whip at the tail of a cart on earth. 
The ancient ghosts, who used to be seen, and the mod- 

20* 



234 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



ern ghosts, who are now only heard, in their " News 
from Heaven " only reveal things taken from our daily 
life. The theological details of the future life are 
chiefly imaginary, and drawn from our daily intercourse 
with common things. 

It seems to me, however, that we may for a certainty 
know this, — that man is immortal ; that I consider as 
fixed as the proposition that one and one make two. 
Then that God is infinitely perfect, a perfect Cause and 
a perfect Providence ; that I consider equally certain as 
that one and one make two. Of course his infinite 
care must extend over the whole existence of mankind ; 
must make the future life an infinite blessing for man- 
kind on the whole, an infinite blessing for every human 
soul. This follows from what has already been said 
of the nature of God ; for the infinite God must create 
his work from perfect motives and for a perfect purpose, 
form it of perfect material and provide it with perfect 
means to attain the perfect end he has proposed. Ac- 
cordingly, his scheme of things must be so contrived 
as at last to achieve perfect welfare for the whole of 
mankind, and for each particular person. 

The Form of the future life we know nothing of — 
whether man shall have a body or no body ; and if a 
body, what shape of body; whether it shall resemble 
the human shape or any other shape that we can im- 
agine. Man can know nothing of that ; no more than 
the unborn babe can dream of the exploits which it 
shall perform in after years, in science, art, and daily 
life. 

I am glad that we do not and cannot know this, I do 
not wish to know; and if it were possible for me to 
receive a " miraculous " knowledge of what should 
take place the other side of the grave, I would say to 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



235 



the being who brought the tidings, " Stand back ! I do 
not wish to know." Time is the best fortune-teller. 
What God has put out of man's power to reach, it is 
not man's need to have, and it is not his wisdom to 
grasp after. 

The notion of eternal misery, of punishment for the 
sake of punishment, the doctrine that God exploiters 
the human race and that men are " tortured for the glory 
of God," — that notion deserves all the scorn, all the hate, 
all the ribaldry, all the mockery which it ever met with 
from Lucian and Lucretius, from Pomponatius and Vol- 
taire, from Thomas Paine and Richter and Feuerbach : 
their hammer is not at all too heavy for their hard 
work. 

But the idea of immortality as it belongs to the 
Absolute Religion, consistent with the Infinite Perfec- 
tion of God, the philosopher need not hate that ; for the 
belief therein is true to the spontaneous consciousness 
of human nature, to the reflective consciousness of phi- 
losophy, and it is of the greatest value to man as a hope, 
encouragement, and reward. Let me be sure of two 
things, — first, of Thine Infinite Perfection, O Father 
in Heaven ! then of my own Immortality, — and I am 
safe, I fear nothing ; I am not a transient bubble on 
the sea of Time, I shall outlast the " everlasting hills," 
I am immortal as the monads of matter, immortal as 
its laws ! I may rely on myself, respect myself, feel 
within me the yearnings after immortality, and I know 
there is an Infinite Heart which yearns infinitely for 
me and will take me to itself and bless me at the last. 

Then I can rely on something better than I see with 
my eyes — on the Ideal Excellence which I think in my 
heart. I can make a sacrifice for it; I can postpone 
my Now for an immortal Then ; I can labor for noble 



236 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



things which it will take a thousand years to accom- 
plish. Things about me may fail, the mountain may 
fall and come to nought and the rock be removed out 
of its place, be exhaled a vapor to the sky — I shah not 
fail. I see 

" The Soul is builded far from accident : 
It suffers not in smiling pomps, nor falls 
Under the brow of thralling discontent ; 
It fears not Policy, — that heretic 
That works on leases of short-numbered hours, 
But all alone stands hugely politic." 

If to-morrow I am to perish utterly, then I shall only 
take counsel for to-day, and ask for qualities which last 
no longer. My fathers will be to me only as the ground 
out of which my bread-corn is grown ; dead, they are 
like the rotten mould of earth, their memory of small 
concern to me. Posterity, — I shall care nothing for 
the future generations of mankind. I am one atom in 
the trunk of a tree, and care nothing for the roots be- 
low, or the branch above. I shall sow such seed as will 
bear harvest at once. I shall know no Higher Law : 
Passion enacts my statutes to-day ; to-morrow Ambi- 
tion revises the statutes, and these are my sole legisla- 
tors. Morality will vanish, Expediency take its place. 
Heroism will be gone, and instead of it there will be 
the brute valor of the he-wolf, the brute cunning of the 
she-fox, the rapacity of the vulture, and the headlong 
daring of the wild bull; — but the cool, calm courage 
which, for truth's sake, and for love's sake, looks death 
firmly in the face and then wheels into line ready 
to be slain, that will be a thing no longer heard of. 
Affection will be a momentary delight in other men. 
The friendship which lays down its life for father, 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



237 



mother, wife, or child, for dear ones tenderly beloved, 
which sucks the poison from their wounds, — the phi- 
lanthropy which toils and provides for the friendless, 
the loveless, the unlovely, and the wicked, — that will 
only be a story of old time, to be laughed at as men 
laugh at the tale of the Grecian boy who loved the 
New Moon as his heavenly bride. 

But if I know that I am to live forever, and when 
yonder sun has seen the whole host of heaven circle 
about the centre of the universe a million million times, 
that I still live on, making a greater progress in every 
forty years than what I have grown to since first I left 
my mother's arms ; — if I know that Mankind will still 
survive with ever-greatening faculties in some other life, 
directed by the same Infinite Mind and Conscience, and 
Heart and Soul that made us first, and guides us in our 
heavenward march ; if I know that each beggar in the 
street, that every culprit in the jail, or out of it, or haling 
men thither, has an immortal soul, and will go on 
greatening and beautifying more and more, — then I 
shall take the highest qualities which I know, or feel, 
and work with them ; and I shall feel that my person- 
ality is one of the permanent forces of the universe, 
and shall toil with conscious dignity and loving awe. 
I shall respect myself, and so respect each brother 
man. 

In a hostile country the enemy builds his house of 
tent-poles and cloth, to last a single night ; pillages the 
neighborhood, hews down the tree to eat its half-ripe 
fruit, careless of the toil which planted and the hope 
that waits therefor ; and to-morrow he marches away, 
his city of a night reduced to tent-poles and canvas, 
packed up in his cart : a bit of vari-colored bunting on 
a stick, is the symbol of his nomadic havoc. But the 



238 



IMMOKTAL LIFE. 



resident farmer carefully gathers and providentially 
plants the seed, and painstakingly rears up the tree, 
prunes it, grafts it, waits his score of years, and then, 
apple by apple, he gathers its fruit, the soft for present 
use, the sound for future store ; and his broad barn of 
limestone, his house of brick, and his marble church, — 
these are the symbols of the resident. So, under the 
stimulus of immortality, we shall cultivate those plants 
of the soul which take deep root, which require years, 
even ages, to grow, and slowly bear their fruit, a bless- 
ing for generations yet to come. 

If I know that I am to live forever, in the heat of 
sensual passion, I shall not set my heart on lust and 
mere bodily delight ; I know something more delight- 
ful. In the period of ambition, I shall not set my heart 
on gold only, or the praise of men ; I know what is 
richer, I know a fame better than fame. I shall remem- 
ber that I am more than passion's slave, or the mad- 
man of ambition ; I shall give both their due, — pas- 
sion its own, and ambition what belongs thereto. 
Riches and honor, — I shall give them both their 
own. Then I shall go deeper down, and bring to 
light the brighter diamonds which I quarry in the hu- 
man mine. 

Consciousness of immortality will not lead to con- 
tempt of this life, to weariness of it, to neglect of its 
duties. Looking up, I shall wish to set my foot on 
every round of the human ladder. In the dark places 
of the earth the candle of the Infinite will shine on the 
habitations of cruelty ; and I shall see the way to stave 
them to the ground, and in their place build up fair- 
faced dwellings for the sons of men. 

To the mortal eye this is a sad world. What a his- 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



239 



tory it is before me, — looking out of these four or five 
thousand eyes ! What daydreams of yours and mine 
have broke into nothing ! What toils unrequited, what 
sorrows which the world did not know, — all laid away 
in our consciousness, stratum over stratum, deposited 
under tranquil or troubled seas ! 

Look at the world ; — at Boston, with all the sorrow 
which festers in her heart ; at happy America, with her 
dreadful evils ; at Europe, with her France, so high, 
and then so low ; with her Germany, full of contem- 
plation, — and a chain on her neck ; with Italy and 
Spain ground under a tyrant's foot ; look at Asia, 
" the cradle of the human race," the cradle turned over 
and the child spilled out ; — at Africa, the nursery of 
the slaves of the world ; — at the Islands of the Sea ; — 
and consider that man is only mortal, and what a spec- 
tacle it is ! I should die outright at the thought of 
that ! But as I know that I shall live forever, and that 
the Infinite God loves you and me, each man that walks 
the ground, — I can look on these evils of the world, 
on America, Europe, with her France, Germany, Italy, 
Spain ; — I can look on Asia, Africa, and the Islands 
of the Sea ; — and it is all only the hour before sunrise, 
the light is coming ; yes, I am also to light a little torch 
to illuminate the darkness, while it lasts, and help until 
the dayspring come. 

How heavy are the griefs of personal mortal life! 
Health decays into sickness, hope into disappointment ; 
death draws near to our little troop of pilgrims, and 
when we pitch our tent he takes away some beloved 
head, — a baby now, then an old man, then a father or 
a mother, a husband or a wife, a relative or a friend,— 
and at last we sit there, near the end of our pilgrim- 
age, solitary, over our night fire, a few embers only left, 



240 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



and they burning low, while the enemy draws near 
to quench them, then clutches us and we vanish also 
into night. 

" Alas for love, if this were all, 
And nought beyond the earth ! " 

The Atheist sits down beside the coffin of his only 
child — a rose-bud daughter whose heart death slowly 
eat away; the pale lilies of the valley which droop with 
fragrance above that lifeless heart, are flowers of mock- 
ery to him ; their beauty is a cheat. They give not 
back his child for whom the sepulchral monster opens 
its remorseless jaws. The hopeless father looks down 
on the face of his girl, silent, not sleeping, cold, dead. 
The " effacing fingers " have put out the eye, yet mar- 
ble beauty still lingers there, and love, a father's love, 
continually haunts the disenchanted house. Atheism 
cannot speed it away ; affection has its law, which no 
impiety of thought annuls. He looks beyond, — the 
poor sad man, — it is only solid darkness he stares upon. 
No rainbow beautifies that cloud ; there is thunder in 
it, not light. Night is behind — without a star. His 
dear one has vanished, her light put out by thunderous 
death, not a sparklet left. There is no daughter for 
him — but alas, he is a father still ; yet no father to her. 
For her whose life the blameless baby took, long years 
gone by, there is no mortal husband, no immortal 
mother. Child and mother are equal now; each is 
nothing, both nothing. " I also shall soon vanish," ex- 
claims the man, " blotted out by darkness, and become 
nothing — my bubble broke, my life all gone, with its 
bitter tears for the child and the mother who bore her, 
its bridal and birthday joys, which glittered a moment 
— how bright they were, then slipped away, — my sor- 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



241 



rows all unrequited, my hopes a cruel cheat. Ah me ! 
the stars slowly gathering into one nock, are a sorry 
sight — each a sphere tenanted perhaps by the same 
bubbles, the same cheats, the same despair — for it is a 
here with no Hereafter, a body with no Soul, a world 
without a God ! " 

Hard by in the same village, the selfsame night, a 
thoughtful man, born, baptized, and bred a theological 
Christian, full of faith in the popular mythology of the 
churches, accepting its grimmest ghastliness, sits down 
by the bedside of his prodigal son, his only child, — 
life's substance squandered on harlots, wasted in riot- 
ous living. Death knocks at the profligate's oft bat- 
tered door : no syren shakes the wanton windows now. 
The last hour of the impenitent has come. The father 
looks on that face so like its mortal mother once, now 
stained by riot, and scarred by lust, the mother's image 
broke and crushed : so in the sack of a city, a statue 
of Mary is whelmed over a church portal, and thrown 
down, and the fragments of shattered loveliness are 
crunched to dust beneath the lumbering cannon wheels 
and vulgar drays, while from the street the artist eyes 
the shards of beauty wrought from his dreams and 
prayers. The father feels the breath of the vampyre of 
the tomb as it slowly numbs the youthful limbs, — joint 
by joint, finger by finger, hand by hand : he sees the 
mist cloud over the inanimate and soulless eye. Life 
slowly ripples out from that once manly heart. Tele- 
scopic memory sweeps the horizon of the father's con- 
sciousness. He remembers the cradle, — bought with 
such triumph ; the birth-night ; the little garments pre- 
viously made ready for the expected guest ; the prayer 
of gratitude for the given and the spared when first he 
saw his first-born son ; he recalls the day of his mar- 

21 



242 



IMMOETAL LIFE. 



riage, when he stood on the world's top and Heaven 
gave him that angel — it seemed so then — to be loved, 
a real angel now, long since gone home to Heaven, her 
heart broken by the son's precocious waywardness. 
The father watches the ebb of mortal life, it is the flood 
of hell, bitter, remorseless, endless hell ; his son sinks 
into damnation — joint by joint, and limb by limb. 
Now he has sunk all over ! The mortal father turns to 
religion for comfort. Theology tells him of the fire that 
is never quenched, of the worm which dieth not, the tor- 
ments of his child — the smoke ascending up forever 
and ever, and bidding him be glad at the eternal an- 
guish of his only son. His Bible becomes a torment ; 
— in the " many mansions " of its Heaven he knows 
none for the impenitent prodigal whom Death drives 
from husks and swine. He looks up after God ; a grisly 
King makes the earth tremble at his frown — angry 
with the wicked every day, and keeping anger forever ; 
there is no Father. He turns to the " Man of Sorrows 
and acquainted with grief," asking " will not Mary's 
Son help me in peril for mine ? for a sword pierces 
through my own soul also." But the Crucified thun- 
ders " Depart from me ye cursed, into everlasting fire 
prepared for the devil and his angels ; " and all the host 
of theological " Christians " respond — " He shall go 
into everlasting punishment ! Amen ! " For him there 
is no Christ — nor never shall be one. Religion is a 
torment, immortality a Curse, and God a Devil ! " Is 
there no Mother for my son ? " he cries. The finger 
of Theology, hiding the morning star, points down to 
Hell, and the voice of Night with cold breath whispers 
" Forever." 

At the grave the " Atheist " and the theological 
" Christian" look each other in the face; one has laid 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



243 



away his daughter for annihilation — he is the father 
of nothing ; the other has buried his son in eternal tor- 
ment, the father of a devil's victim, of a soul forever 
damned ! What comfort has the one from Nothing, the 
other from Hell ? Human Nature tells both, " it is a 
lie. Atheism is here a lie ; the popular theology is 
there another lie." 

Yes, it is a lie. Eternal morning follows the night ; 
a rainbow scarfs the shoulders of every cloud weeping 
its rain away to become flowers on land and pearls at 
sea ; Life rises out of the grave, the Soul cannot be 
held by festering flesh. Absolute Religion puts this 
ghastly theology to everlasting rest ; the Infinite Mother 
will mercifully chasten, heal, and bless even the prodigal 
whom death surprised impenitent ; Love shall cast out 
fear. 

But conscious of the infinite perfection of God, with 
the consciousness of immortality in my heart, all this 
time I smile through my tears, as Death conveys in his 
arms, one by one, the dear ones from my side. I see 
them go up like fabled Elijah in his car of flame. I 
see their track of light across the sky, and I am con- 
tented ; I am glad ; I also shall presently journey in 
the same chariot of fire, and sit down again beside the 
dear ones who have gone before ; — 

" Nightly I pitch my moving tent 
A clay's march nearer home." — 

I smile on it all, and am a conqueror over Death. 

My friends, I look at things as they are, at least strive 
to do so, and if I had come to the conclusion that man 



244 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



was mortal only, I should proclaim my conscientious 
conclusion, strongly, and clearly, and right out. If I 
thought in my heart that there was no God, why, then 
I should proclaim that odious conviction. Nay, if I 
believed in the God of the popular theology, the God 
who retails agony and damns babies, paving his 
spacious hell with " skulls of infants not a span 
long," — that he made religion a torment, immortality 
a curse, and was himself a devil, why I should tell that 
too, — and would never hold back from mortal men 
what I thought Truth, howsoever much it might tear 
my own heart to get it, or my lip to proclaim it. But, 
looking with what philosophy I have, with what nature 
God has given me, I come to the other conclusion, and 
wish only that I had poetic eloquence to set it forth till 
it went into every man's heart, and drove fear out there- 
from, and planted everlasting life therein. 

I see not how any man can be content with blank 
annihilation, to have no consciousness of immortality, 
no consciousness of God. — Chance ! Fate ! Annihila- 
tion ! 

" Are these the pompous tidings ye proclaim, 
Lights of the world, and demi-gods of fame ? 
Is this your triumph — this your proud applause, 
Children of Truth, and champions of her cause ? 
For this hath Science searched, on weary wing, 
By shore and sea — each mute and living thing ? 
Launched with Iberia's pilot from the steep, 
To worlds unknown, and isles beyond the deep ; 
Or round the cope her living chariot driven, 
And wheeled in triumph through the signs of heaven ? 
Oh ! star-eyed Science, hast thou wandered there 
To waft us home the message of despair ? — 
Then bind the palm, thy sage's brow to suit 
Of blasted leaf and death-distilling fruit ! " 



IMMORTAL LIFE. 



245 



" What is the bigot's torch, the tyrant's chain ? 
I smile on Death, if heavenward Hope remain ! 
But if the warring winds of Nature's strife 
Be all the faithless charter of my life ; 
If Chance awaked, — inexorable power ! -— 
This frail and feverish being of an hour ; 
Doomed o'er the world's precarious scene to sweep, 
Swift as the tempest travels on the deep ; 
To know Delight but by her parting smile, 
And toil, and wish, and weep, a little while ; — 
Then melt, ye elements, that formed in vain 
This troubled pulse and visionary brain ! 
Fade, ye wild flowers, memorials of my doom ! 
And sink, ye stars, that light me to the tomb ! " 

But with the • consciousness of immortality, with a 
certain knowledge of the Infinite Perfection of God, 
the perfect Cause, the perfect Providence, I can do all 
things : no doom is hopeless ; disaster is the threshold 
of delight. 

" Nearer, my God, to Thee ! 

E'en though it be a cross 
That raiseth me, 

Still all my song shall be, — 

Nearer, my God, to Thee, 
Nearer to Thee ! " 



21* 



SERMON VIII. 

OF PROVIDENCE IN GENERAL. 

(247) 



GENESIS XXII. 8. 

GOD WILL PROVIDE. 

(248) 



VIII. 

A SERMON OF PROVIDENCE. 



In a previous sermon I have already spoken of the 
Infinite God as Cause, and as Providence. But the 
constant Relation of God to the world which He 
creates and animates, is a theme too important to be 
left with the merely general treatment I have bestowed 
upon it. Atheism and the Popular Theology are both 
so unphilosophical in their Theory of the Universe ; the 
function ascribed to finite Chance, the Supreme of the 
Atheist, in the one case, and to the Finite God, the 
Supreme of the theologian, in the other, is so at 
variance with the primitive spiritual instincts of human 
nature, and so unsatisfactory to the enlightened con- 
sciousness of cultivated and religious men, that the 
subject demands a distinct and detailed investigation 
by itself. It will require three sermons: — the first 
going over the matter very much at large and treating 
of Providence in its universal forms, the others relating 
to the application thereof to the various Phenomena of 
Evil — to Pain and Sin. I shall not hesitate to repeat 
the same thoughts and even the same forms of expres- 
sion, previously made use of in these sermons. I do 
this purposely, both to avoid the needless multiplication 

(249) 



250 



PROVIDENCE. 



of terms, and the better to connect this whole series of 
discourses together. 

The notion that God continually watches over the 
world and all of its contents is one very dear to man- 
kind. It appears in all forms of conscious religion. 
The worshipper of a fetiche regards his bit of wood, or 
amulet, as a special Providence working magically and 
exceptionally for his good alone. Polytheism is only 
the splitting up of the idea of God into a multitude of 
special Providences — each one a sliver of deity. Thus 
man has 

" Parcelled out the glorious name." 

The Catholic invokes his Patron Saint, who is only 
a rude symbol and mind-mark of that Providence which 
is always at hand. Pantheism puts a Providence in 
every blade of grass, in each atom of matter. The 
Epicureans of old time denied the Providence of God 
and dreamed of lazy deities all heedless of the Uni- 
verse. But their theory is eminently exceptional in the 
theological world, yet performing a service and correct- 
ing the extravagance of men who run too far, in devout 
exaggeration attributing all to God's act. 

In virtue of the functions of Providence ascribed to 
God, he is called by various names : Lord, or King, 
means providential Master ruling the world and ex- 
ploitering its inhabitants for his good, not theirs. That 
is the favorite Old Testament notion and title of God : 
he is King, men are subjects, or even slaves. Yet other 
names therein appear, for the Old Testament is not 
unitary. In the New Testament, from his providential 
function God is often called Father, indicating the 



PROVIDENCE. 



251 



affection which controls his power: he is not merely 
King over subjects, and Lord over slaves, but a Father 
who rules his children for their good, restrains that he 
may develop, and seemingly hinders that he may really 
help. Hence in the Old Testament, slaves are bid to 
fear God ; in the New Testament, children are told to 
love him. However, the New Testament is not more 
unitary in this respect than the Old, and the cruel God 
appears often in the Gospels, the Epistles, and the 
Apocalypse, not a Father but only a Lord and King, 
exploitering a portion of the human race with merciless 
rapacity. 

A King is bound politically to provide for his sub- 
jects, inasmuch as he is king ; political providence is the 
royal function. A father is affectionally and paternally 
bound to provide for his children, inasmuch as he is 
father; affectional providence is the paternal function. 
But as the father, or the king, is limited in his powers, 
so the paternal or political function is limited ; for duty 
does not transcend the power to do. Their providence 
is necessarily imperfect, not reaching to all persons in 
the kingdom, or to all actions of their subject. A good 
king and a good father, both, wish to do more for their 
charge than their ability can reach. Their desirable is 
limited by their possible. 

The Infinite God is infinitely bound to provide for 
his creatures, inasmuch as he is infinite God ; Infinite 
Providence is the divine function, his function as God. 

A Duty involves reciprocal obligation ; a Right is the 
correlative of a Duty. There is a human Duty to obey, 
reverence, and love God, with our finite nature; but 
also, and just as much, is there a human Right to the 
protection of God. So there is a divine Duty on God's 



252 



PROVIDENCE. 



part, of Providence toward man, as well as a divine 
Right of obedience from man. I mean to say, as it 
belongs to the finite constitution of man to obey, rev- 
erence, and love God — the duty of the finite toward the 
Infinite ; so it belongs to the Infinite constitution of 
God to provide for man — the duty of the Infinite to- 
ward the finite. Obedience belongs to man's nature, 
Providence to God's nature. We have an unalienable 
lien upon his Infinite Perfection. 

I know men often taUt as if God were not amenable 
to his own Justice, and could with equal right care for 
hi s creatures or neglect them ; that his Almighty power 
makes him capable of immeasurable caprice and lib- 
erates him from all relation to Eternal Right. Hence 
it is often taught that God may consistently make a 
vessel of honor or of dishonor out of this human clay, 
as the potter does ; or may consistently jest with his 
material, waste it, throw it away, destroy it, as the 
potter's apprentice does for sport in some moment of 
caprice ; or may break the finished vessels as the potter 
himself does when drunk, or angry. In virtue of this 
general notion, it is popularly taught in all Christendom 
that God will thus waste some of his human clay, cast- 
ing human souls into endless misery; and in the 
greater part of Christendom it is taught that he will 
destroy the majority of mankind in this way; that he 
has a natural Right to do so, and man has no Right to 
any thing but the caprice of God. 

This doctrine is odious to me ; and I see not how 
men can entertain such an idea of God, and still call 
him good. This doctrine is equally detestable whether 
you consider it in relation to the condition of men con- 
sequent thereon, or to the character of God which 
causes that condition. This false idea tends to unsettle 



PROVIDENCE. 



253 



men's moral convictions. The consequence appears in 
various forms. The State teaches in practice that na- 
tional Might is national right ; that so far as the state is 
concerned there is no right and no wrong ; whatever it 
may will is justice, the nation not amenable to moral 
law. The Church theoretically teaches that Infinite 
Might is infinite right; that God repudiates his own 
Justice : that so far as God is concerned there is no 
right, no wrong; with him caprice stands for reason. 
The atheist agrees with the theologians in this, only he 
rejects the ecclesiastical phraseology, knowing no God. 

I will not speak of Mercy, commonly conceived of as 
the limitation of Right, strong manly Justice obstructed ' 
by womanly sentiment and weakness. But speaking 
of bare Justice I say, that from the idea of God as Infi- 
nite it follows that he has no right to call into being a 
single soul and make that soul miserable for its whole 
life; or to inflict upon it any absolute and unrecom- 
pensed evil ; no right to call into life a single worm and 
make that worm's life a curse to itself. It is irreverent 
and impious to teach that he could do this. It is a 
plain contradiction to the idea of God. It is as impos- 
sible for him to create any thing from an imperfect mo- 
tive, for an imperfect purpose, of imperfect material, or 
as imperfect means, as it would be for him to make 
Right, wrong, the same thing to be and not to be, or 
one and one, not two, but two thousand. I as finite 
man am amenable to the laws of my finite, human na- 
ture ; he as Infinite God to the laws of his infinite, di- 
vine nature. To say that God has a right, or a desire, 
to repudiate his Infinite Justice, that he will do it, or 
that as God he can, is as absurd as to say that he will 
and can make one and one two thousand and not two. 
And to me it seems as impious as to say there is no 

22 



254 



PROVIDENCE. 



God. Indeed it is a denial of God, not merely a nega- 
tion of his phenomenal existence, but of the very Sub- 
stance of his Being. 

Now from the Infinite Perfection of God it follows 
that his Providence is Infinite, that is, completely perfect 
and perfectly complete ; that as Cause and Providence 
he works continually to bless his creatures, and only to 
bless them. 

This must be so : for the opposite could only come 
from a defect of Wisdom — he did not know how to 
bring about then* welfare ; from a defect of Justice — 
he did not will their welfare ; from a defect of Love — 
he did not desire it ; from a defect of Power — he could 
not bring it to pass ; or a defect of Holiness — he would 
not use the power, love, justice, and wisdom for his 
creatures' sake. This might be said of conceptions of 
God as finite, — of Baal, Melkarth, Jupiter, Odin, Je- 
hovah ; never of the Infinite God ; he, inasmuch as he 
is God, must exercise an infinite Providence over each 
and all his works. The universe, that is, the sum total 
of created matter and created mind, must be perfectly 
fitted to achieve the purpose which God designs ; that 
must be a benevolent purpose, involving the greatest 
possible bliss for each and all, for the Infinite God could 
desire no other end. 

From this it follows that the material part of the 
universe, and its spiritual part also, must be perfectly 
adapted to this end. A perfect whole, material or spirit- 
ual, consists of perfect parts, each answering its several 
purpose, and so the whole fulfilling the purpose of the 
whole. No part must be lost ; no part absolutely sacri- 
ficed to the good of another, or of all others, and to its 
own harm and ruin. 

All this follows unavoidably from the idea of God as 



PROVIDENCE. 



255 



infinitely perfect. Starting from this point all is plain. 
But concrete things often seem imperfect because they 
do not completely serve our transient purpose, while 
we know not the eternal purposes of God. We look 
at the immediate and transient result, not at the ulti- 
mate and permanent. Thus the mariner cannot come 
to port by reason of the storm and rocks which obstruct 
his course ; he thinks the weather imperfect, the world 
not well made, and you often hear men say, " How 
beautiful the world would be if there were no storms, 
no hurricanes, no thunder and lightning." While if we 
could overlook the cosmic forces which make up the 
material world, we should see that every actual storm 
and every rock was needful ; and the world would not 
be perfect and accomplish its function had not each 
been put there in its proper time and place. 

An oak-tree in the woods appears quite imperfect. 
The leaves are coiled up and spoiled by the leaf-roller ; 
cut to pieces by the tailor-beetle ; devoured by the hag- 
moth and the polyphemus, the slug caterpillar and her 
numerous kindred ; the twigs are sucked by the white- 
lined tree-hopper, or cut oft' by the oak-pruner ; large 
limbs are broken down by the seventeen-year-locust ; 
the horn-bug, the curculio, and the timber-beetle eat up 
its wood ; the gad-fly punctures leaf and bark, convert- 
ing the forces of the tree to that insect's use ; the grub 
lives in the young acorn ; fly-catchers are on its leaves ; 
a spider weaves its web from twig to twig ; caterpillars 
of various denominations gnaw its tender shoots ; the 
creeper and the woodpecker bore through the bark; 
squirrels — striped, flying, red, and gray — have gnawed 
into its limbs and made their nests ; the toad has a hole 
in a flaw of its base ; the fox has cut asunder its fibrous 
roots in digging his burrow ; the bear dwells in its 



256 PROVIDENCE. 

trunk which worms, emmets, bees, and countless insects 
have helped to hollow ; ice and the winds of winter 
have broken off full many a bough. How imperfect 
and incomplete the oak-tree looks, so broken, crooked, 
cragged, gnarled, and grim ! The carpenter cannot get 
a beam, the millwright a shaft, or the ship-builder a 
solid knee for his purpose ; even the common wood- 
man spares that tree as not worth felling ; it only cum- 
bers the ground. But it has served its complicated 
purpose ; given board and lodging to all these creatures, 
from the ephemeral fly, joying in his transient summer, 
to the brawny bear for many a winter hibernating in 
its trunk. It has been a great woodland caravansary, 
even a tavern and chateau, to all that heterogeneous 
swarm ; and though no man but a painter thinks it a 
perfect tree, — and he only because the picturesque 
thing serves his special purpose, — no doubt the good 
God is quite contented with his oak, and says, " Well 
done, good and faithful servant." He designed it to 
swerve these manifold uses, and also to furnish beauty 
for the painter's picture and meaning for the preacher's 
speech. Doubtless it enters into the joy of its Lord, 
having completely served his purpose ; he wanted a 
caravansary and chateau for these uncounted citizens. 
To judge of it we must look at all these ends, and also 
at the condition of the soil that had a superabundance 
of the matter whereof oak-trees are made. 

We commonly look on the world as the carpenter 
and mnlwright on that crooked oak, and because it 
does not serve our turn completely we think it an im- 
perfect world. Thus men grumble at the rocky shores 
of New England, its sterile soil, its winters long and 
hard, its cold and biting spring, its summers brief and 
burning, and seem to think the world is badly put to- 



PROVIDENCE. 



257 



gether. They complain of wild beasts in the forests, 
of monsters in the sea, of toads and snakes, vipers and 
many a loathsome thing — hideous to our imperfect 
eye. How little do we know ! a world without an 
alligator, or a rattlesnake, a hyaena, or a shark, would 
doubtless be a very imperfect world. The good God 
has something for each of these to do ; a place for them 
all at his table, and a pillow for every one of them in 
Nature's bed. 

Though Theologians talk of the infinite goodness of 
God and the perfection of his Providence, they have yet 
a certain belief in a Devil ; even if it is not always a 
personal devil, at any rate it is a Principle of Absolute 
Evil, which they fear will, somehow, outwit and over- 
ride God, getting possession of the world ; will throw 
sand into the delicate watch-work of the Universe and 
completely thwart the Providence of the Eternal. 

This comes from that dark notion of God which 
haunts the theology of Christendom ; yea, of the Hebrew, 
the Mahometan, and Hindoo world. It is painful to 
see how this notion prevails amongst intelligent and 
religious men. They tell you of the greater activity of 
the Evil Principle ; they see it in the insects which in- 
fect the grain and fruit-trees of New England, forget- 
ting that God takes care of these insects as well as of 
man. When we study deeper, we see that there is no 
evil principle, but a good principle, so often misunder- 
stood by men. If we start with the idea of the infinite 
God we know the purpose is good before we compre- 
hend the means thereto. 



There are two ways in which men assert the doctrine 

99* 



258 



PROVIDENCE. 



of God's Providence, two philosophical and antagonis- 
tic doctrines thereof. 

I. One makes God the only Will in creation ; ani- 
mals are mere machines, wholly subordinate to their 
organization ; man is also a mere machine, wholly sub- 
ordinate to his organization. Thus all the action in the 
world, material and spiritual, is the action of God. 
The universe consists of two parts, one real, the other 
phenomenal. First, there is God the Actor ; next, a 
parcel of Tools or Puppets, wholly passive, having no 
will or life of their own ; and with these God works, or 
plays. On this supposition his Providence has a clean 
sweep of the universe ; every sentiment, good or bad ; 
every thought, true or false ; every deed, blessing or 
baneful, is his work. The sun is an unconscious instru- 
ment of God ; I am a conscious instrument, but still a 
bare tool in God's hand, not a free agent. 

This comprehensive scheme, reducing life to mechan- 
ism, appears in many forms. It belongs to the gross 
philosophy of the materialist ; it is the cardinal doctrine 
of the pantheist, material or spiritual, the most offensive 
and dangerous of his doctrines. It is the great idea 
with the fatalists of all Classes. But it appears in the 
theological sects also, as well as in philosophic parties ; 
for man cannot escape from his first principle, neither in 
philosophy nor in theology. It lies at the basis of the 
Catholic and Protestant theology. Calvin and d'Hol- 
bach agree in this. The contradiction it leads to is 
plain in the preaching and writings of almost every Cal- 
vinistic or Catholic Theologian who tries to reconcile 
his theology with the common facts of consciousness. 
Now he says you must do for yourself and then God 



PROVIDENCE. 



259 



will help you ; but adds you can do nothing till God 
begins* it for you. The popular hymn contains the 
same contradiction, 

" Bound on a voyage of awful length, 
Through dangers little known, 
A stranger to superior strength, 
Man vainly trusts his own. 

" But oars alone will not prevail 
To reach the distant coast ; 
The breath of Heaven must swell the sail, 
Or all the work is lost." 

But in Dr. Hopkins and Dr. Emmons and their fol- 
lowers and predecessors, as well Protestant as Catholic, 
this doctrine is logically carried out to its natural re- 
sults : in defiance of consciousness ; they boldly and 
simply declare that God is the direct author of every 
thought and feeling, will and deed. It is curious to see 
how men reach the same result, starting from opposite 
points ; curious to see how Antinomianism — Catholic 
or Protestant — arrives at the most objectionable char- 
acteristic of Pantheism, which it yet so abhors. 

On this hypothesis the function of Providence ap- 
pears quite simple : all action is God's action. The 
phenomenal actor may be human, but the only real 
agent is God. For example : Cain kills Abel with a 
club, the spite of his heart flashing from his angry eye. 
That is the phenomenon. But the fact is, God killed 
Abel with Cain's arm ; Cain and the club were equally 
passive instruments in the hand of God. Here the in- 
tervention of Cain, with his malicious feeling and flash- 
ing eye, is only a part of the stage machinery, for theat- 
rical effect, but the contriver and worker of it all is God. 



260 



PROVTDEXCE. 



His ways are simple : matter and man have re ally- 
nought to do. This doctrine shocks common, sense 
and is at war with the consciousness of every man. It is 
eminently at war with religious feeling ; for on this sup- 
position actual suffering and sin are of no human value ; 
they lead to nothing ; it is in vain for the grass to grow, 
the human hay is cut and dried by foreordination. 

II. The other doctrine of Providence makes man s 
will free, absolutely free, not at all conditioned by cir- 
cumstances, bodily organization, and the like. The phi- 
losophical question of freedom and necessity I do not 
design to enter upon. It is one of the most difficult 
questions in metaphysics, and I certainly am not able 
to solve the riddle. There are difficulties in either hy- 
pothesis, and I have not psychological science enough 
to explain them in the court of intellect. Philosophy 
is intellect working in the mode of art ; Common Sense 
is intellect working after its natural instinct, not in the 
technical mode of art. Philosophy demonstrates ; com- 
mon sense convinces without demonstration. In de- 
fault of philosophy, we must follow common sense ; that 
does not settle the matter scientifically and ultimately, 
but practically and provisionally, subject to revision in 
another court. But common sense decides in favor of 
Freedom. Every man acts on that supposition ; and 
supposes that other men are likewise free. Courts of law 
proceed on this hypothesis ; public opinion distributes 
praise or blame ; my own conscience commends, or else 
cries out against me. I am conscious of freedom. 

But a little experience shows that this freedom has 
its limitations and is not absolute. It is conditioned 
on every side, — by my outward circumstances, the 



PROVIDENCE. 



261 



events of my history, the accidents of education, the 
character of my parents and daily associates ; by the 
constitution of my body — its varying health, hunger 
and thirst, youth, manhood, and old age. In compari- 
son with a shad-fish, or a blackbird, Socrates has a good 
deal of freedom, and is not so much subordinate to his 
organization, or his circumstances, as they ; but in 
comparison with the infinite freedom of God his voli- 
tiveness is little. To speak figuratively, it seems as if 
man was tied by two tethers — the one of historic cir- 
cumstance, the other of his physical organization — 
fastened at opposite points, but the cord is elastic and 
may be lengthened by use, or shortened by abuse and 
neglect ; and within the variable limit of his tether man 
has freedom, but cannot go beyond it. Still further, to 
carry out the figure, one man gets entangled in his con- 
fining line and does not use half the freedom he might 
have ; another continually extends it and becomes more 
free. 

It is plain that however these circumstances may or 
may not limit our ideas, or will, they must determine 
the form of our conceptions and our power to execute 
them in works. 

On the hypothesis that man is absolutely, or partial- 
ly free, the function of Providence is much more com- 
plicated. There are primary and secondary powers ; 
there are other agents beside God, using the power 
derived from him to work with after their own ca- 
price : so God acts in part by means of the freewill 
of men. This theory seems to me conformable to 
common sense and common consciousness, and is per- 
haps the most philosophic of any that has yet been 
arrived at. 



262 



PROVIDENCE. 



So much for these two theories of Providence. 

There are two modes in which God's providence is 
commonly supposed to act, namely, the General and 
the Special. 

God's general providence, it is said, takes in the 
greater part of cases in the material and spiritual world, 
and provides for them. In this way he is thought to 
accomplish his function by general laws, which are a 
constant mode of operation, representing the continual 
and inferior activity of God ; but this does not extend 
to all cases. God's special providence attends to par- 
ticular cases, not otherwise provided for, and disposes 
of them. One is a court of common or statute law, the 
other a court of equity. In special providence God is 
supposed not to act by general laws, but without them, 
or against them. All normal action in Nature comes 
from general providence ; ail Miracles from special 
providence. Thus a freshet in the Connecticut, and 
the annual rising of the Nile, belong under the general 
providence of God and come by the action of steadfast 
laws ; but the miraculous Flood in the time of Noah 
came of God's special providence, having no cause in 
Nature, only in the caprice of God. This form of spe- 
cial providence in Nature is known only to the theolo- 
gian, not to the man of science. 

To take examples from human affairs, it is main- 
tained that God's general providence waited on the 
whole human race, but the Hebrews were under his 
special providence, and he went so far in then case as 
to make a contract with Abraham, which St. Paul 
thought God was under an obligation to keep, and 
could not invalidate. 



PROVIDENCE. 



263 



All men in general are under the general providence, 
but Christians enjoy the special providence of God, or 
as Dr. Watts has it, 

" The whole creation is thy charge, 
But Saints are thy peculiar care." 

It is said that the forms of religion in China, India, 
Egypt, Greece, and Mexico, came by the general provi- 
dence of God, growing out of the nature of man, or 
coming at the instigation of the devil, having their root 
in the human or the infernal nature ; while the Hebrew 
and the Christian forms of religion came by his special 
providence, started in God, and were miraculously 
transplanted to human soil. 

Certain Christians are thought still more eminently 
under God's special providence. They are the " elect," 
and the world was made for them. The Mahometan 
thinks the same of his form of religion and of the elect 
Mussulmans. Christian theologians say that saints, 
the elect, share the " covenanted mercies " of God and 
are favorites, enjoying his special providence, while the 
rest of men are left to his " uncovenanted mercies," and 
have need to tremble. The governor of Massachusetts 
a few years ago, in his proclamation for a day of fast- 
ing, invited men to pray God to bless the whole United 
States in general, but to have " a special care of the 
good State of Massachusetts." The Hebrews, thinking 
God cared nothing for the Gentiles, praised him saying, 
" Thou didst march through the land in indignation. 
Thou didst thrash the heathen in anger ; thou wentest 
forth for the salvation of thy people ; " " Thou didst 
drive out the heathen with thine hand." 

So Christians think God has his favorites amongst 
men, and, like a partial father, takes better care of some 



264 



PROVIDENCE. 



of his children than of the rest: yon and I share his 
common concern and are under his general laws ; Jesus 
of Nazareth had his special care and was under special 
laws. It would be thought a great impiety to suppose 
that God felt as much concern for Judas as for Jesus, 
and would no more suffer the son of Simon to be ulti- 
mately lost, than the son of Mary. Yet if you think 
twice you will see that the impiety is on the other side ; 
for if God does not care as much for Iscariot as for 
Christ, as much desiring and insuring the ultimate 
triumph of the one as the other, then he is not the In- 
finite Father whose ways are equal to all his children, 
but partial, unjust, cruel, wicked, and oppressive. You 
do not think so well of the British government because 
it neglects its feeblest subjects, the laboring millions, 
making England the paradise of the rich and strong, 
the purgatory of the wise and good, and the hell of the 
poor and weak. You condemn the government of the 
United States because it has its favorites, and oppresses 
and enslaves the feeblest of its citizens to increase the 
riches of indolent and cruel men. You would not 
employ a schoolmaster who turned off the dull boys and 
beat the bad ones, disposed to truancy and mischief, 
driving them out into the streets to swelter in crime, 
to fester in jail, or rot on the gallows. What indigna- 
tion would suffice towards a mother who neglects a 
backward boy, takes no pains with the girl that is a 
cripple, or with a son who has an organic and hereditary 
tendency to dissipation and licentiousness ? I do not 
like to say a man is impious without proof that he 
means it ; but to attribute so base a character and such 
unjust conduct to God as you would not respect in a 
government, allow in a schoolmaster, or endure in a 
mother, is thoughtless, to say the least of it But that 



PKOVIDENCE. 



265 



is the common idea of God in the Christian churches, 
and the common idea of his providence. 

The modern notion of a special providence, wherein 
God acts without law or against law, is the most spirit- 
ual and attenuated form of the doctrine of miracles, the 
last glimmering of the candle before it goes out. Men 
who give up the miraculous birth of Jesus still claim 
that he was under the special providence of God. As 
the State has general laws which apply well enough to 
the majority of cases, but has special legislation for 
the exceptional cases w^hich were not provided for by 
the general statutes; and as it has a jury whose func- 
tion is to determine if the law shall punish this or the 
other man who has violated it, so the popular theology 
teaches that God's providence has its general legisla- 
tion, which applies well enough to the majority of cases, 
and its special legislation, which applies only to the ex- 
ceptional cases, with its particular mercy, which like the 
jury refuses to execute the law when it seems too hard. 
For it is tacitly taken for granted by the popular theol- 
ogy that God did not foresee and provide for all the 
wants of the Universe, material or spiritual, but is some- 
times taken by surprise, things not turning out as he 
designed or expected, and so he must interfere by special 
miracles, mend his work, set up makeshifts and pro- 
visional expedients. Thus it is represented that the 
loneliness of Adam in Paradise, his seduction and fall, 
the subsequent wickedness of his descendants, the trans- 
gressions of the Hebrews, and the general sinfulness of 
mankind at a later day, were all a surprise to the Crea- 
tor, things not turning out according to his thought. 
New expedients must accordingly be devised to meet 
the unexpected emergency. 

In like manner it is taught that Jesus of Nazareth 

23 



266 



PROVIDENCE. 



was under the special providence of God ; that all his- 
tory prepared for him and pointed to him ; that he had 
a special mission ; while you and I are only under the 
general providence, history has not prepared for us, does 
not point to us, and we have no special mission; — in 
short, that. Jesus is a providential man, with a provi- 
dential function and history, while you and I are not 
providential men and have no providential history or 
function. 

This common theological notion of the limited gen- 
eral providence and limited special providence of God 
belongs to the very substance of the popular theology, 
and springs from its idea of God as finite in power, in 
wisdom, in justice, and in love. Some ancient and some 
modern philosophers, seeing the change and progress in 
manifestation, believe there is a corresponding change 
in the manifestor, and declare that God is not a Being 
but a Becoming. The popular theology has the same 
vice, — though the theologians are not conscious thereof, 
and denounce it, believing that God grows wiser by 
experiment, and must alter his plans. Yet in con- 
tradiction of their own statements, they declare him 
without variableness and shadow of turning ; while ac- 
cording to the popular theology the history of God is 
a history of revolutions, even in his dealing with his 
chosen people, the revelation through the Messiah being 
flat opposite to the revelation through Moses which it 
annuls. Pantheism and the popular theology, hostile 
as they are, agree in this strange conclusion — the 
negation of the Infinite, and the affirmation of a vari- 
able God. The pantheist consciously denies the one 
and affirms the other, in laying down his premises ; the 
theologian does it unconsciously, in developing his con- 
clusion. 



PKOVIDENCE. 



267 



From the Nature of God as Infinite, from the rela- 
tion he sustains to the creation, as perfect and perpet- 
ual Cause thereof, it follows that his Providence must 
be not barely special — eminently providing for certain 
things, — or general — taking care of the great mass but 
letting exceptional particulars slip through his fingers ; 

— it must be universal. It must extend to each thing 
he has created, to all parts of its existence and to every 
action thereof. If it be not so, then either some parts 
of creation are entirely derelict of God, destitute of his 
Providence, without his care, neglected by him and out- 
laws from God, put to the ban of the Universe ; or else 
destitute of his Providence during some portions of their 
existence, or in some acts of their lives. Either case is 
at variance with the Infinite nature and function of God. 
For when the Infinite God created the universe, it must 
have been from a perfect motive, of a perfect material, 
for a perfect purpose, and as a perfect means thereto ; 
and he must therefore have understood it all completely 

— in each of its parts, and perfectly — in all the details 
of each part; and, knowing all the powers, he fore- 
knows all the actions, necessitated or contingent, and 
provides for each. This must be true of the Universe 
as a whole ; and of each part thereof. All its actions 
must be thus provided for. The laws of the Universe, 
the constant modes of operation of the material or 
human forces, must be founded on this complete and 
perfect knowledge, and coextensive therewith, and be 
exponents of that motive and servants of that purpose. 
This is what is meant, when it is said the laws of 
matter and of mind, belong to the nature and consti- 
tution of matter and of mind. These laws are formed 
after a complete knowledge of all the properties, func- 
tions, and consequences of matter and mind. Before 



268 PROVIDENCE. 

there were two particles of matter in existence, the Infi- 
nite God must have understood the law of attraction, 
in its larger form as gravitation, its smaller as cohesion, 
and have known that thereby the tower of Siloam would 
one day fall and slay eighteen men ; that many a beet- 
ling crag would tumble to the ground, and Alpine land- 
slips bring thousands of men to premature destruction. 
But all those laws, thus made, must coincide with the 
motive of God and be means for his purpose ; they 
must suit the welfare of the whole creation and of each 
part thereof. This must be true of the material world 
which is unconscious and not free ; of the animal world 
which is not free yet partially conscious ; of the human 
world which is conscious and partially free ; and of all 
superhuman worlds with higher degrees of conscious- 
ness and freedom. 

To this universal extent must all things be under the 
Providence of God ; to this extent his constant modes 
of operation must needs reach out. 

Then if you look at the relation of God to any one 
thing, say the grub of a Buprestian beetle boring into 
the bough of the oak I just now spoke of, it seems as if 
God made the bough of the tree expressly for that little 
incipient insect ; and the oak for the bough ; and the 
soil for the oak : the globe, with all its ups and downs, 
which Geology relates, seems made for the soil; and 
the Universe for the globe. So it appears that that 
little larva of a beetle is the end, or final cause, of the 
universe, stands on the top of the world, and has all 
creation to wait on him, with the God thereof as provi- 
dential overseer. Then regarding this grub as the one 
thing the Universe was designed to serve, theologians 
might say, " Behold God's providence is special ; He 



PROVIDENCE. 



269 



has special legislation to suit this Buprestian grub, and 
has aimed the whole world at this mark. See how all 
things prepare for that ; the sun and moon are only its 
forerunners, and in the fulness of time behold a grub ! " 

But when the theologian studies the condition of the 
next grub in an oak-apple, or a gall-nut, or in the near- 
est bough, he finds them all as well conditioned, and 
sees that God takes care of the Lymexylon, the Hyle- 
csetus, and the Brenthus as well as of the Buprestian ; 
that each of them stands just as much on the top of the 
world, with the universe to wait thereon and God as 
overseer. You may study all the inhabitants of the 
oak-tree — the toad, the squirrel, the fox, the bear, it is 
true of them all. Yes, it is true of every special thing 
in the world, when you fully understand that special 
thing in all its existence, in each act of its life. We 
cannot by experiment and observation prove this so 
clearly in every instance as in some special case, but 
starting with the Idea of God as infinite, the conclusion 
follows at once, — that his Providence in reference to 
each particular thing is a perfect Providence. 

Then if you look at the relation of God to the Uni- 
verse, you see that, as far as you understand it, the 
whole is as well taken care of and provided for as the 
most contented grub who lives on the bounty of the 
oak ; and you say, " Here is general providence, God 
acting by general laws for general purposes ; things 
work well on the whole, and £ if now a bubble bursts, 
and now a world,' it is only a small exception. The 
attraction of gravitation is a good thing, it keeps the 
world together; and if the tower of Siloam, thereby 
falling to the ground, slays eighteen men of Jerusalem, 

23* 



270 



PROVTDEXCE. 



that number is too small to think of, considering the 
myriad millions who are upheld by this same law." 

A law that is perfectly special, providing for each, 
is also completely general, providing for all. In other 
words, it is universal. God's Providence must be infi- 
nite, like his nature. Special and general are only 
forms in which we conceive of that providence ; — in its 
relation to a single thing men name it special, to many 
things, general, while it extends to all and is universal. 
Accordingly it neither requires nor admits of miraculous 
makeshifts and provisional expedients, which theolo- 
gians think indispensable to their finite God. 

When God created mankind he must have given 
thereto the powers which are requisite to accomplish all 
his purpose. This must be true of mankind as a whole, 
and of Amos and Habakkuk, of each man, as a part 
thereof ; of each man considered individually as an 
integer, and considered socially, or humanly as a trac- 
tion of the community, or race, and so a factor in the 
social, or general human result of the life of mankind. 
Of course God must foreknow what use or abuse 
would be made of these powers, given in their present 
proportion, just as well as he knows it now, after all the 
experience of centuries. Knowing human nature, he 
must foreknow human history. For example, God 
must have foreknown that young children would stum- 
ble bodily in getting command of their limbs, in learn- 
ing to walk, and suffer pain in consequence thereof; 
that older children would stumble spiritually in getting 
command of their spirits, in learning to think and to 
will, and suffer in consequence of that ; that mankind 



PKOVIDENCE. 



271 



as a whole would stumble in getting command of the 
material world, and the development of their human 
powers ; and accordingly there would be suffering from 
that cause. 

Now God, inasmuch as he is God, acts providen- 
tially in Nature not by miraculous and spasmodic fits 
and starts, but by regular and universal laws, by con- 
stant modes of operation ; and so takes care of material 
things without violating their constitution, acting al- 
ways according to the nature of the things which he 
has made. It is a fact of observation that in the mate- 
rial and unconscious world he works by its materiality 
and unconsciousness, not against them ; in the animal 
world by its animality and partial consciousness, not 
against them. Judging from the nature of God and 
of man, it must be concluded that in the providential 
government of the human world, he acts also by regular 
and universal laws, by constant modes of operation ; 
and so takes care of human things without violating 
their constitution, acting always according to the hu- 
man nature of man, not against it, working in the hu- 
man world by means of man's consciousness and par- 
tial freedom, not against them. 

Here in the human world God's providence must 
be as complete and as perfect as there in the material 
or animal world, in each department acting by the nat- 
ural laws thereof, not without or against them. As by 
•the very constitution of material or animal things God's 
providence acts by the natural laws thereof — statical, 
dynamical, and vital laws — so from the very constitu- 
tion of man it appears that his perfect Providence must 
work according to the spiritual laws thereof ; for it is 
not conceivable either that God should devise laws not 
adequate for his purpose, or capriciously depart from 



272 



PROVIDENCE. 



them if made adequate. Call this Providence special 
as it applies to Hophni and Phineas, or general as it 
applies to all the children of Jacob, it is plain that it 
must be universal, applying to all material, animal, and 
human things. 

If these things are so, if God be Infinite, then the 
Hebrew nation is under his universal Providence ; but 
the Amalekites whom the Hebrews overthrew, and the 
Romans who captured the conquerors, and the Goths 
who vanquished the Romans, are all and equally under 
the universal Providence of God who cares equally for 
t _ em all. Not only are the nations under his Providence 
in their great acts, but in their little every-day transac- 
tions. Theologians love to think that God was present 
with the Hebrews in their march out of Egypt, at 
Mount Sinai ; that their exodus and legislation were 
providential. It is all true ; but the same Providence 
watched equally over the English Pilgrims in then exo- 
dus ; over the British Parliament making laws at West- 
minster, the American Congress at Philadelphia and 
Washington. It is well to see this fact in Hebrew his- 
tory ; well also to go further forward and see it in all 
human history, and to know that human nature is 
divine Providence. 

The common theological notion of a special Provi- 
dence, with its special favorites, is full of mischief. 
Some intensely national writer in the Hebrew Old Tes- 
tament tells us that Noah cursed the descendants of 
Ham for their father's folly ; theologians inform us that 
in consequence thereof his descendants are cast-off, out- 
laws from God. But there are no outlaws from the 
Infinite Father : to say he casts off any child of his, 



PROVIDENCE. 



273 



Hebrew or Canaanite, is as absurd as to say he alters 
the axioms of mathematics, or the truths of the multi- 
plication table. It is inconsistent with the nature and 
constitution of the Infinite God ; it is as impossible as 
that one and one should be two thousand, and not 
two. The African nations, whom the Caucasians en- 
slave, must be as dear to God as the pale tyrants who 
exploiter them, just as much under his infinite Provi- 
dence, which will not suffer any ultimate and un recom- 
pensed evil to befall the black or white. 

All individuals then must be equally under the same 
providential care of the Infinite God ; not merely great 
men, the Charlemagnes, the Cromwells, the Napoleons, 
" men of destiny " as they are called, but the little men ; 
not merely the good men, the heroes of religion, the 
Moseses and the Jesuses, but the ordinary men, and 
wicked men, not barely in their great moments, when 
they feel conscious of God, but in their daily work and 
humble consciousness. Then it is plain that not only 
Moses and Jesus are providential men intrusted with a 
special mission, but you and I and each man are just 
as much providential men, equally intrusted with a 
mission, not the less special because it is humble and 
and our powers are weak. The unnatural Spartan 
father rejects and disdains his idiot girl, leaving her to 
perish on Mount Taygetus ; the theologian casts off his 
son, grown up wicked and a public criminal, leaving 
him to perish unpitied in his jail. But the loving-kind- 
ness of the Infinite Father watches over the fool ; the 
tender mercy of the Infinite Mother takes up the crimi- 
nal when mortal parents let him fall. There is no child 
of perdition before the Infinite God. 

Now God, as the infinitely perfect, must accomplish 



274 



PROVIDENCE* 



his providential function by the laws which belong to 
the nature and constitution of things ; that is, by the 
normal and constant mode of operation of the natural 
powers resident in those things themselves ; in material 
and animal nature by the forces and laws thereof ; in 
human nature by its forces and its laws. For as Prov- 
idence is the divine execution in time of the eternal 
divine purpose, it is absurd to say that God supersedes 
or annuls the means which he primarily designed for 
that purpose. The classic deist supposed the material 
world was the work of one God ; and the arrangement 
of human affairs the work of another. Between the 
two there was a collision and a quarrel, the world-gov- 
ernor must interfere with the work of the world-maker ; 
Causality and Providence were antagonistic. But 
with the idea of the Infinite God this antithetic dual- 
ism vanishes at once away. 

The creative Causality of the Infinite God is like- 
wise conservative and administrative Providence. 

So from the nature of the infinitely perfect God and 
the consequent perfection of his motive, material, pur- 
pose, and means thereto, it follows that he will not de- 
stroy as- infinite Providence what he created as infinite 
Cause ; that He will not violate the laws and break the 
constitution which he himself has made. Accordingly, 
in the midst of God's Providence working from a per- 
fect motive, for a perfect purpose, and by means of the 
constitution and nature of man, a Providence extending 
to all men and to their every act, it is plain that Hu- 
man Freedom is safe, and the Ultimate Welfare of each 
man is made sine of, as certain as the existence of God, 
or of man. 

Atheism tells you of a world without a God, a great 
going, but a going with none to direct : the popular 



PROVIDENCE. 



275 



Theology declares that this going is directed by a finite 
and changeable God, jealous, revengeful, loving Jacob 
and hating Esau, working by fits and starts, even in 
wrath destroying what he made imperfect, beginning 
anew and designing to torment the great mass of man- 
kind in everlasting woe — " miserable to have eternal 
beinsf." 

But with the absolute "Religion, a knowledge of God 
as Infinite how different do all things appear ! "We 
have confidence, absolute trust in the motive and Pur- 
pose of God, absolute trust also in the Means which he 
has provided in the nature and constitution of things. 
The human faculties become then the instruments of 
Providence. Every man is under the protection of 
God — and all fear of the final result for you, or me, or 
for mankind, quite vanishes away. The details we 
know not ; experience reveals them a day-full at a time ; 
the result we are sure of. 

Timid men who think that God is miserly and the 
great Hunker of the Universe, sometimes fear the ma- 
terial world will not hold out ; some little " perturba- 
tions " are discovered, now the Earth approaches the 
Sun for many years, perhaps never twice has described 
exactly the same track ; so they fear the earth will fall 
into the fire and the world be burned up. But by and 
by we find that these " perturbations " only disturbed 
the astronomer, doubtful of God; that to the Cause 
and Providence of the world they were eternally known, 
fore-cared for ; that they are normal acts of faithful 
matter, and so all undisturbed the world rolls on. Con- 
stant is balanced by constant. Variable holds variable 
in check. In her cyclic rotation round the earth the 
Moon nods ; the Earth oscillates in her rythmic round, 
while the Sun nods also, as the centre of gravity of the 



276 



PROVIDENCE. 



solar system shifts now a little this way, then a little 
that ; nay the whole Solar System, it is likely, swings 
a little from side to side : but all this has been foreseen, 
provided for, balanced by forces which never sleep, and 
one thing set over against another in such a sort that all 
work together for good, and the great Chariot of Mat- 
ter sweeps on through starry space keeping its God- 
appointed track. Such is the Providence of God in the 
Universe, not an atom of star-dust is lost out of the sky, 
not an atom of flower-dust is lost from off this dirty 
globe ; such are the laws by which God works his func- 
tions out in Nature. Ignorance is full of dread and 
starts at terrors in the dark, trembles at the earthquake 
and the storm. But science justifies the ways of God 
to matter, knowing all and loving all, discloses every- 
where the immanent and ever active force. "Where 
Science does not understand the mode of action, nor 
read the details of perfection clearly in the Work — it 
points to Infinite Perfection in the Author, and we 
fear no more. 



SERMON" IX. 

PROVIDENCE — THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 

24 ( 277 > 



ECCLESIASTICUS XLJI. 24. 

HE HATH MADE NOTHING IMPEEFECT. 

(278) 



IX. 



OF THE ECONOMY OF PAIN AND MISERY UNDER 
THE UNIVERSAL PROVIDENCE OF GOD. 



Last Sunday I spoke of Providence in its most gen- 
eral form, as the universal execution of the perfect pur- 
poses of God by the perfect means He had originally 
devised. Closely connected with this are two things 
which demand attention, namely, the phenomena 
which are called Evil and Sin, and the relation there- 
of to the causal and providential function of the In- 
finite God. 

To understand this matter of Evil, to know its mode 
of origin and of operation, and the purpose it serves, 
considerable nicety of thought is necessary ; and of 
course considerable precision in the terms which ex- 
press and define thought. 

The word Evil is ambiguous in its meaning, and has 
both a wide and a narrow signification. Sometimes it 
means something painful for which there is no ade- 
quate compensation to the sufferer. Sometimes it 
means something painful for which there is an ade- 
quate compensation to the sufferer. In this Sermon I 
will use the word Evil in its general and ambiguous 

(279) 



280 



PKOVIDENCE. 



sense, while the two special forms thereof, — the un- 
compensated and the compensated, — I will call Abso- 
lute Evil and Partial Evil. 

So much for the definition of these terms. 

The phenomena called Evil may for convenience, be 
distributed into two general forms, or modes : — ■ 

I. Evil which does not come from a conscious and 
voluntary transgression of a natural law of the Body or 
the Spirit ; that is, Pain and Misery. This may be 
more minutely designated and distinguished by refer- 
ence to the part through which we suffer — as physical 
pain, suffering by the body ; spiritual pain, suffering by 
what is not body. 

II. Evil which comes from a conscious and volun- 
tary transgression of a natural law of the body or the 
spirit ; that is Sin, meaning thereby the transgression 
with all its subjective and objective consequences. 

So much also for the definition of these terms. 
To-day I shall speak only of Pain and Misery ; and 
of them chiefly in the form of Physical Evil. 

In the world of mere Matter, there is no conscious- 
ness, no freedom, no will. It is subject wholly to stat- 
ical and dynamical laws in their various forms; and 
there is therefore no Pleasure and no Pain. That 
department of creation seems designed merely for a 
theatre on which animated beings are to find scope 
for action, and whence they may obtain their means 
of livelihood. I think no man pretends to find any evil 
there. 

But there is the world of Animals and of Man con- 
scious in higher or lower degrees, and with more or less 
of freedom, gifted with partial power of will. Here is 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



281 



the field for Pleasure and Pain — the elements of Hap- 
piness and of Misery, the two poles of life. Here occur 
the phenomena of Evil. 

By Pleasure I mean the state which comes from the 
fulfilment of the natural conditions of animate exist- 
ence ; from the normal satisfaction of natural desires. 
By Pain I mean the state which comes from non-fulfil- 
ment of those natural conditions ; from the absence of 
the normal satisfaction of those desires. Of course I 
include in that state not only the negative form of evil 
— lack of the desirable, but the positive form of evil — 
presence of the hateful. Happiness is prolonged pleas- 
ure ; Misery is prolonged pain. 

Happiness is great in proportion to the greatness of 
the faculties which seek their natural satisfaction ; and 
in proportion likewise to the completeness of the satis- 
faction itself. So there is a qualitative distinction, of 
the specific modes of Happiness — as it comes from sat- 
isfying high or low desires ; and a quantitative distinc- 
tion of the particular degrees thereof — the satisfaction 
being partial or total. On the other hand Misery is 
great or little in proportion to the faculties and their 
satisfaction ; and there is the same qualitative and quan- 
titative distinction — of modes and degrees thereof. 

Let us now look at some of the phenomena of 
Physical Evil. And for clearness' sake let us attend 
first to the simplest forms thereof, and thence ascend 
up to the more complex and difficult. 

" In the Animal world happiness usually preponderates 
over misery. The two most powerful groups of instincts 
in the animal world are those which relate to the pres- 

24* 



282 



PROVIDENCE. 



ervation of the individual and the perpetuation of the 
race. Those instincts are commonly satisfied. Hence 
comes the general aspect of happiness throughout this 
department of the universe. Not one mosquito in a 
million, it is probable, ever tastes of blood ; and not one 
in a million ever suffers from hunger. You never saw 
a melancholy fly, or a wild squirrel that was unhappy ; 
the elephant, the lion, the monkey, and the crocodile 
seem to have a good time in the world. Happiness is 
obvious in the young of animals ; but it is just as act- 
ual in the old, only it assumes a graver form, and so 
is not so apparent to the careless, or inexperienced eye : 

" Thy creatures leap not, but express a feast, 
Where all the guests sit close, and .nothing wants." 

Still some animals, it is obvious, suffer pain ; all are 
capable of it ; perhaps all the higher animals, some time 
in their lives, are made to suffer. It may be asked, " Is 
it possible that there shall be pain in the animal world 
which the Infinite God has created from perfect motives, 
of perfect material, for a perfect purpose, and as a per- 
fect means thereto ? " I answer, Yes. 

I do not pretend that I can clear up all the difficulties 
in this matter by the inductive mode — of studying 
the details, and thereby learning their law and showing 
how each particular form of evil turns into good ; — I 
shall be obliged to refer to the idea of God as Infinite, 
and from that deduce the value of the function of the 
special forms of pain and misery. This will often 
happen. The wisest man is only a child as yet. Phi- 
losophy has read but few pages of this great book of 
Nature, whereof all must be known fully to understand 
a part. When I know there is an Infinite God, I am 
sure that his purpose is good and his means adequate ; 



THE ECONOMY OF PAHS'. 



283 



I spontaneously trust therein. This instinctive trust 
outruns the reflective demonstration of science. Still 
it is both pleasant and satisfactory to learn the use 
and function of things by themselves, by an inductive 
study of the facts, and not be constrained to deduce the 
conclusion merely from the idea of God. In some in- 
stances this is not difficult ; nay, in the present condition 
of science, it is not hard to learn the general tendency 
of things in Nature, and thence get the analogy Gf the 
whole to help explain particular parts. But no man I 
think as yet has been able to explain all these cases 
by the purely inductive process. To do that he must 
know all the powers and consequent actions and history 
of each thing in the universe. 

All finite things must needs be conditioned ; the In- 
finite alone is absolutely self-conditioned. Thus the 
bodies of animals must needs depend on the world 
about them ; wherein are things helpful — meant for 
the animals they serve, and things harmful — not meant 
for the animals they hurt. Continued use of the harm- 
ful things would destroy the individual and so the race. 

Accordingly the animal frame is made susceptible 
of Pain from the use of the harmful Substances, and 
of Delight from the use of the helpful. 

Sometimes this pain comes before the consummation 
of the use : thus poisonous plants are commonly odious 
to the eye, or nauseous to the smell, or hateful to the 
taste of the creature they would injure. Here the 
momentary pain, the transient disgust, comes as a fore- 
warning against a foe. Poisonous plants, it is said, 
have somewhat in their structure which warns off the 
animals they would else destroy, some special ugliness 
telegraphing to the senses, the unfitness of the thing 



234 



PROVIDENCE. 



for use. " The Devil,*' says a chemist, " is always 
chained.'' If not he is painted black, to scare away 
the creatures he would molest. How nicely the sheep 
and horses avoid all noxious things. Lobelia would 
kill horses ; the pungent plant reads the riot-act of Na- 
ture as soon as it is tasted and warns the offenders of 
their transgression. The benevolent motive and pur- 
pose of this form of pain is obvious at once. 

Then there are Modes of Action which are possible 
to an animal, but which would be fatal if persisted in : 
these also are attended by pain. A young rabbit heed- 
lessly running through briars tears his tender skin and 
smarts ; and so avoids this rending of Ins coat. If the 
pain did not warn him, he would tear his skin to pieces 
and lose his life in seeking to save it. A dog running 
over sharp stones would soon wear out his feet : the 
pain warns him of the peril before it is too late. If he 
were to lose a limb he must go limp and lame all his 
life, for another leg will not shoot out to take the place 
of the one he has wasted and used up. The suffering 
makes him careful ; he keeps his feet, and goes four- 
legged all his days. 

The lobster and the crab have a thick and nearly in- 
sensible shell, for protection against ravenous enemies ; 
but such is the nature of their covering that their limbs 
are brittle and easily rent off, another soon taking the 
place of that which is lost. The animal suffers but little 
pain from that injury. With him it is no great hard- 
ship to lose a limb which is so easily supplied anew. 
But the lobster cannot bear any great change of tem- 
perature, such is his constitution ; it would destroy his 
life. So his shell is a good conductor of heat, and he 
is keenly sensitive to the alternations of heat and cold. 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



285 



This sensitiveness and the pain it brings if he goes out 
of his proper temperature, keep him always in such 
places as suit his organization, in a temperature con- 
genial to his nature, in waters which also supply his 
food. The dog can bear a great range of temperature, 
clad in his non-conducting coat, which also accommo- 
dates itself to the changes of climate. Variations of 
heat and cold are not painful to him. The dog's sen- 
sitiveness of touch, and the lobster's sensitiveness to 
heat and cold bring pain to both; but the suffering 
keeps the lobster in his place, and preserves the limbs of 
the dog safe and sound. Give the dog the lobster's in- 
sensibility to pain from the sense of touch, he would run, 
or fight till he wore his legs off of his body ; give the lob- 
ster the dog's sensitiveness to this form of pain, and 
living as he does in the ceaseless wash of the waters, 
with brittle limbs, his life would be a torment while it 
lasted, and in torment would it soon end. Give the 
dog the lobster's sensitiveness to heat and cold, he 
would be miserable most of the time and soon die 
give the lobster the dog's indifference to temperature, 
the currents of the sea would soon sweep him away 
from his food, from his natural position, and he and his 
race would speedily perish. The pain of both is only 
adequate to keep each in his proper place : it is the 
tether by which they are bound out and kept from 
harm. 

Such is the general use of this form of pain in the 
animal world ; it is a natural warning against ruin, a 
sentinel for ever mounting guard over the natives of the 
earth, the sea, and air, giving early admonition when 
danger draws nigh. 

If you look widely and carefully, you will find there 
is always the most nice and cunning adaptation of the 



286 



PROVIDENCE. 



pain to the end it is to answer. Is a condition of ex- 
istence neglected, an instinct left without its satisfac- 
tion; is a wrong mode of action resorted to, or im- 
proper food eaten, uneasiness and pain warn the of- 
fender of his mistake, and drive him from it. This 
pain is so effectual that the master-instincts of an ani- 
mal become irresistible: only external violence can 
check the rush of Nature, and if driven out she soon 
comes back. How uneasy are the birds of passage at 
the time of their annual migrations ! Their pain warns 
them against the ruin which a northern winter, or a 
southern summer, would bring upon the Swallow, or the 
Stork. 

The pain which comes from Fear is of the same re- 
medial character. The Hare has a feeble body ; a rude 
touch drives her life out of the thin walls of its habita- 
tion. She is the natural prey of the hawk, the fox, and 
the wild-cat ; even the mink and the weasel easily 
master her. See how she is furnished with quick, ca- 
pacious, and variable ears, with prominent and ready 
eyes ; nimble to start and swift to run. She is cautious, 
timid, and fearful to a remarkable degree ; she runs 
from any danger, facing nothing that is formidable. 
She has no power to resist any of her natural enemies. 
Fear is her sentinel. When her last hour comes, she 
dies almost at a touch from her enemy, apparently with 
little pain. Her chief sufTering is from fear, and that is 
only adequate to attach her life to her. 

So far as I have seen, or read, this is true in all de- 
partments of animal life — the ordinary mode of death, 
though often a violent one, is attended with very little 
pain ; and the sufTering from fear is only sufficient to 
keep the creatures on their guard. The bull is strong 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



287 



and tough, able to endure a severe contest with a pow- 
erful enemy. He is constitutionally courageous, and 
marches forth to meet the danger which threatens him. 
The timidity of the hare would be ridiculous in the bull, 
and his fearlessness fatal to her. 

Then there is the pain which animals suffer at the 
Loss of their Mates, or their Young. You see exam- 
ples of this in all animals that match in pairs, and guard 
and protect their little ones. The monogamous robin 
mourns at the loss of his mate, or at the plunder of his 
nest. The ferocious white bear, it is said, moans like 
a human mother at the loss of her cubs. The suffering 
of sheep and cows when their children are torn from 
them, is too well known and very sad. But this pain, 
with the attendant fear of the loss, is only sufficient to 
lead the mates to protect each other, the parents to 
watch over and defend their child. This fear often 
creates a certain heroism in the bosoms of animals 
which are otherwise cowardly. The hen is commonly 
a garrulous and restless busybody, bustling about all 
day, a weak and timid animal, fleeing from every tri- 
fling danger. When the maternal instinct moves her to 
brood over the eggs which contain her unseen progeny, 
how all is changed ! The restless busybody sits silent 
and patient as a stone, all day incumbent on her nest. 
An extraordinary amount of heat is developed in her 
body. Her timidity vanishes ; she becomes courageous, 
and rushes out to defend her nest, and still more to pro- 
tect her new-born brood. She defies danger, and will 
sacrifice her life rather than desert her little flock. If 
the brood is lost, her torment is exceeding great. After 
her fledglings are grown up they become strangers to 
her ; her anxiety and her courage vanish out of sight, or 



288 



PROVIDENCE. 



sleep as a reserved power, till another occasion calls 
them forth. Here pain is the ally of affection, the fam- 
ily girdle to keep her little household together. In ani- 
mals which require no parental care, there is no fear of 
this sort, no affection for it to guard. The salmon and 
the herring drop their embryo in the appropriate spot, 
leaving it to the care of Nature. After the young calf 
has outgrown the need of its mothers care, to her it is 
but one of the common herd ; the feeling of kindred is 
extinct. 

In all these cases the conservative function of these 
four forms of pain is evident at once, as soon as the 
facts are made known. And the balance between the 
provisional pain and the final purpose it is to serve is 
so exactly sustained, that it is a delight to the think- 
ing man to see the ways of Providence with these 
little children of the common Father. 

" Each creature hath a -wisdom for his good : 

The pigeons feed their tender offspring, crying, 
"When they are callow ; but withdraw their food 

When they are fledge, that Need may teach them flying." 

Still there are sufferings in the animal world for 
which I can see no present recompense. Some lose a 
limb in youth and suffer all their life ; others are scantily 
fed. Those in the hands of man are often maimed, ill- 
treated, and hindered from developing their nature as 
animals, and so made to suffer. Man " improves " the 
breeds of cattle. He does not always improve them as 
horses, cows, or swine, but only as animated tools for 
his service. Sometimes he only exploiters them. His 
" racers " and " draft horses," his " Ayrshires," and 
" North-Devons," his " Merinoes " and " Saxonies," are 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN". 



289 



as much works of human invention as the spinning-jenny 
and the printing-press. Very useful contrivances for 
man's purpose, they are less horses, oxen, and sheep, it 
seems to me, than were their savage progenitors thou- 
sands of years ago. They have suffered a change. 
They cannot defend themselves if turned out in the 
forests, nor find their food in the wild where the Aurochs 
rejoices to live. But I doubt that this change is at- 
tended with any necessary unhappiness. The domestic 
dog seems to me quite as happy an animal as the wild 
dog. If we take into the account all the animals con- 
nected with man, with or without his consent, they have 
far more happiness than misery. The horse and the 
cow seem in part designed for the use and service of 
man, and may perform that service with no unnatural 
harm to themselves. Their nature is exceeding pliant 
under the plastic hand of man ; the artificial forms of 
the cow-kind seem to me as happy as the wild forms. 

But still there is pain and misery in the animal 
world. Now howsoever Paul may interpret the He- 
brew Bible, it is plain the Infinite God " doth take care 
for oxen." The injuries of a whale that in his childhood 
gets his jaw broken, and goes all his life with a twisted 
mouth, a deformed and most unlucky whale ; the mis- 
fortunes of a horse owned by some master more beastly 
than the brute, must have all been known by God at 
the creation, provided for and compensated in some 
way. The use of animal pain in the majority of cases, 
it is easy to discern, and to see that it has a benevolent 
function to accomplish. The general analogy of Nature 
leads to the inference — it is no more, — that it must 
likewise be so in these exceptional cases. But from 
the Idea of the Infinite God we know it must be so ; 
that this exceptional pain must not be absolute evil to 

25 



290 



PROVIDENCE. 



the individual sufferer, but disciplinary — leading to 
some good else not attainable ; and so compensated by 
the ultimate welfare which it helps attain. I do not 
pretend to know how this is brought about ; I know not 
the middle terms which intermediate between the mis- 
ery I see and the blessedness I imagine. I only know 
that the ultimate welfare must come to the mutilated 
beast overtasked by some brutal man. If it be not so 
then the universe is not a perfect world ; it is imperfect 
in this particular, that it does not serve the natural pur- 
pose of these creatures, who go incomplete and suffer- 
ing. If God be Infinite then he must make and admin- 
ister the world from perfect motives, for a perfect pur- 
pose, and as a perfect means, — all tending to the ulti- 
mate and absolute blessedness of each thing he directly 
or mediately creates ; the world must be administered 
so as to achieve that purpose for each thing. Else God 
has made some things from a motive and for a purpose 
not benevolent, or as a means not adequate to the be- 
nevolent purpose. These suppositions are at variance 
with the nature of the Infinite God. 

I do not see how this benevolent purpose can be ac- 
complished unless all animals are immortal and find 
retribution in another life. I know many will think it 
foolish, and some impious, to speak of the Immortality 
of Animals. But without this supposition I cannot 
" vindicate the ways of God " to the horse and the ox. 
To me the immortality of all animals appears in har- 
mony with the analogy of Nature, rational, benevolent, 
and beautiful. Many of the arguments for human im- 
mortality apply as well to the case of the bee and the 
elephant as to John and Paul. The argument from 
consciousness is here out of place — as man knows 
nothing of the consciousness of the sheep and swine. 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



291 



There are but two arguments which I have ever heard 
brought against the immortality of animals — one is 
drawn from the selfishness of man, who wants a mo- 
nopoly of all desirable things, and so would shut beast 
and bird out of heaven ; the other comes from the 
common notion of the Deity, that he is a mean and 
stingy God, making heaven little and hell large. Let 
both pass for what they are worth. If the Spanish In- 
quisitor and the American Kidnapper can be thought 
immortal and capable of eternal happiness, I see not 
how we can deny eternal life to any Abyssinian Hyae- 
na, or to a Rattlesnake from Kentucky, far less ugly 
and venomous. It seems to me that philosophical 
theology confirms the instinctive nature of the " poor 
Indian," 

" Who thinks, admitted to that equal sky, 
His faithful dog shall bear him company." 

If this be so, then pain or misery in the animal world 
is not an Absolute Evil ; in the majority of cases it is 
a beneficent sentinel to warn creation of the approach 
of ruin, and in the exceptional cases is a servant that 
by some unknown way conducts to bliss, 

" Making a chiming of a passing-bell." 

In the World of Man the affair is much more com- 
plicated ; but if the animal world be rightly understood, 
this other is not difficult to comprehend. The amount 
of individual freedom is so much greater with men than 
with animals, that we commonly say, man is free — 
self-ruled, — while beasts are bound, ruled wholly by 
some objective force, tools and not agents. Man's 



292 



PROYIDEXCE. 



tether is indeed much longer than theirs ; and his mar- 
gin of possible oscillation is much greater. For man 
having powers so much more various, and consequently 
an immediate destination so much nobler, stands, in 
general, in more complicated relations with Nature, 
and the individual with his species, and is subject to a 
greater variety of conditions. Accordingly there is 
with him so much the more room for generic and 
individual caprice, for violating the conditions of wel- 
fare and of material existence ; so much more room for 
pain and misery. This is so with mankind, and with 
each man, at every particular stage of his conscious 
existence. 

But in addition to this statical complication of his 
nature, man has other dynamical complications which 
take place in his historical development. Man is pro- 
gressive ; each man advancing not only from babyhood 
to manhood, — for that is so with the lion and the lob- 
ster, — but also from manhood till death. Not only is 
each man thus progressive as an individual, but each 
nation as a people, and mankind as a race. Amid the 
fluctuations of individuals the nation rolls on from its 
babyhood to its manhood ; and amid the fluctuations 
of states and families, of nations, the mighty Stream 
of Humanity sweeps on to its destination, bearing in 
its eternal bosom every human excellence which any 
individual or any people, has developed and brought to 
light. 

At every step the individual, the nation, and the race 
are subject to the natural conditions of personal, social, 
and general human welfare ; conditions which are rig- 
orous and unavoidable. All this development of the 
individual and the race is progress by experiment ; for 
while the crystal is formed, and the tree grows, by pro- 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



293 



cesses which have their origin solely in the Infinite 
Cause ; while each individual lion and the whole lion- 
kind grow up with little conscious thought, or personal 
will, the individual man, and the man-kind do to a con- 
siderable extent shape their own forms of being. This 
progression by experiment involves both experiments 
that fail and experiments that succeed. The failure 
brings pain ; if long continued, misery. This is so 
with the merely speculative experiment, with thought: 
the faulty demonstration, "the sum which will not 
come out right," pains the boy at school ; the halting 
tragedy racks the feeble-minded poet ; nay the imper- 
fections in the works of Homer and ^Eschylus, of Dante 
and Shakspeare, tortured those mighty bards. Still 
more is this the case with practical experiments, with 
deeds: the little girl, learning the limits between the 
Me and Not-me, mistakes and burns her fingers in the 
candle's flame ; the great nation learning the limits 
between the Just and the Unjust, or the Expedient 
and Unprofitable, mistakes and loses millions of men 
Necessity confines the beasts within a narrow road 
where instinct impels them on ; they cannot wander 
much. Freedom opens for us a long and wide field, 
with opportunity for pain and misery. The child 
makes unsuccessful experiments in becoming a man ; 
the man in reaching after more manhood^ mankind, 
in all our history makes experiments that fail; all are 
painful. Such are the conditions of our human lot, 
conditions which to the nature of a finite, progres- 
sive, and free being seem as much indispensable as 
gravitation to atoms of matter representing the pri- 
mary law. 

The actual amount of pain and misery is far greater 
in the human world than in the animal world. It 

25* 



294 



PROVIDENCE. 



seems to me greater in proportion to their respective 
quantity of being. The Caucasian baby is a grief to 
her mother before she rejoices that a child is born ; he 
is a torment to himself before he has his first teeth; a 
trouble to his father in growing up. Man has all the 
animal sources of pain, and many more peculiar to 
himself, springing from his more mountainous quantity 
of being, its nicer quality, and the greater complication 
thereof. The grown animal is not capable of progres- 
sive development; has no experiments to make, no 
failures to mourn over, nor suffer from. The race of 
animals makes no failures, no progress, no experiment. 
No lion in Africa weeps for his prodigal son. The 
tigress is not crossed in love. No patrician game-laws 
hinder the fox from " free warren " everywhere. The 
hippopotamus has no feudal superior ; the wild-cat has 
eminent domain in the woods, " free fishing and fowl- 
ing." There is no despotic Nicholas or Ferdinand to 
torture the race of wild swine, with unreasonable insti- 
tutes hedging in the liberty of Nature. No revolution- 
ists, no red-republicans jostle the rulers of the woods 
and seas ; no progressive Kossuths and Mazzinis over- 
turn the oligarchy of white or black elephants, and form 
a democracy among the cattle. There is no pain from 
bad institutions, — no failure to have good ones. No 
timid owl or monkey is ever alarmed at the " Spread 
of Infidelity." The ravens that wander crying for lack 
of meat and finding it as they fly, have no fear of 
eternal damnation, no " Adam's fall " to make their 
faces gather blackness; the "federal head" of the crows 
never " fell." There is no popular theology, no atheism, 
with the pigeons and blackbirds. 

The aspect of the world of animals is one of happi- 
ness. What a contrast between that and the condition 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



295 



of man ! The bob-o'-link in the grass under my window 
seeking food for her little nest-full of promises, is happy 
as a bird can be ; her joy runs over in delightful song. 
Her beauty of sound meets the morning beauty of 
light, and what a psalm they sing, the sunrise and the 
bird, to eye and ear ! Compare her with the mothers 
in the houses all about me, and in the great cities of 
the world, the mothers who groan in labor — of beg- 
gary, of prostitution, of drunkenness, of many-liveried 
sin! Not one mosquito in a million suffers from 
hunger; of the thousand million men how many will 
die outright of starvation ; how many go stooping and 
feeble for want, and will at last be thereby shuffled 
off the stage of life ! How contentedly this caterpillar 
makes ready for her transfiguration, one day to come 
out fair as the light with more than mythical resplen- 
dence. How sadly the seamstresses of Boston, New 
York, and London, prepare their garments of trans- 
figuration — the shroud which painful fingers are so 
long in making ready for death, who is always in sight, 
yet so slow in coming! What an odds between the 
Song of a Cocoon and " the Song of a Shirt ! " This 
grasshopper, 

" Green little loiterer in the sunny grass, 
Catching his heart up at the feel of June," 

is never to seek for his daily bread. Yonder cow takes 
no thought for raiment ; the beaver is not afraid of be- 
ing warned out of his lodgings and turned upon the 
world, his wife and children brought to the side-walk ; 
the pains of parturition and dentition, with that troop 
of diseases which crowd about the cradle of human 
infancy, are all unknown to the wild camel, the bear, 
and the elephant. The buffalo is never concerned for 



296 



PROVIDENCE. 



the raiment of his sons and daughters, clad and shod in 
Nature's best. No wild-cat has any difficulty in train- 
ing up her sons ; the horse-leech has no concern for 
the marriage of his two proverbial daughters. Every 
oyster is contented with his own " bank." There are 
no changes of tariff to perplex the free-traders of sea, 
and land, and sky. No protective system is repealed 
to the damage of the insect-manufacturers — of the bee, 
or the spider, or the silk-worm. The Providence of God 
is the great Protective-system for all these children of 
the world. The universal laws — they never change. 
The aristocracy of the ant-hill does not exploiter the 
common people ; not a queen bee feared a crisis in 
" the year of revolutions." Compare a hive of bees — 
in woods or garden, — or a family of beavers, with 
Boston or Lowell, with Paris or Lyons ; and what an 
odds betwixt the welfare of the two! Consider the 
poverty, the want, the ignorance, the disease, the drunk- 
enness, and vice, and crime, and shortened life, which 
make up the misery of the poor ; consider the anxiety 
and servility, the disappointed ambition and defeated 
affections, which so mar the welfare of the thriving and 
the rich ; and what a difference there is between this 
human misery and the contentment of the beast ; — a 
difference which, at first sight, seems out of proportion 
to the different degrees of power and of freedom — 
misery increasing as the square of the amount of free- 
dom ! The whole world of Nature does not furnish 
a St. Giles parish for the beasts ; not a human city is 
without one ! 

Still omitting nothing and extenuating nothing, it 
seems to me the proportion of misery in the world is 
overrated by benevolent men. Happiness, contentment 
of the actual wants, surpasses unhappiness, that discon- 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



297 



tented hunger after what cannot be reached. It is so in 
convents and asylums, with the poor in large towns 
like London and New York, — such is the human 
power of accommodation to circumstances. Plastic 
man is pliant also. Take any settlement of men, Es- 
quimaux, Pawnees, Turks, Chinese, Gaboons, Bush- 
mans, Britons, happiness far surpasses misery. Go into 
the lowest parts of Boston, or London, to the abodes of 
want and crime, it is so there. True it is a low form 
of happiness, and you mourn at so much contentment 
with so little welfare. 

Yet there is pain and misery of the saddest sort. It 
comes from non-fulfilment of the conditions of animal 
life — from want of food, of fire, air, and water, of shel- 
ter and raiment ; from sickness, fear, grief ; from the 
lack, or the loss, of objects of passion and affection; 
from defeated ambition, defeated love ; from want of 
culture — of one or all the faculties. 

AH this must have been foreseen ; it is a part of the 
scheme of things — the calculated consequence of man's 
ignorance, or want of self-adaptation to the world of 
matter. It can be no astonishment to God. Yet at 
first sight it appears as if there was an imperfection in 
God's work. This misery, which haunts mankind, 
seems a disgrace to the world and a standing impeach- 
ment of the Providence of God. " Call this a perfect 
world," says some kind-hearted man, " a perfect means 
for a perfect purpose ? Under the Providence of the 
Infinite God is it ! — Then whence this vermin pain 
which bores into every house and every heart ? The 
world is full of Evil, Absolute Evil ; this toad, ugly and 
venomous, squats, full of poison, in every garden which 
man plants. Could not God make a world without 
Misery?" 



298 



PROVIDENCE. 



Well, the finite must needs be conditioned — its ex- 
istence one of limitation. The question is whether the 
present condition contains any absolute, or any need- 
less partial Evil. As it was shown before, pain is inci- 
dental to the development of a finite being with even a 
small amount of freedom. But as man is more free, 
and individually and generically progressive, a larger 
amount of pain is incidental to his existence. But look 
at some conjectural schemes of human life. 

Suppose man had been made with no capability of 
progress either of the individual, from manhood to old 
age, or of the race, from the beginning to the end ; and 
put in the rudest condition of the lowest tribe of men — 
of the Bushmans, or the Patagonians ; but had all his 
wants as completely and as easily met as the oysters in 
the waters of Virginia, so that the whole world was a 
perpetual Point Comfort to each man ; that there was 
no pain, no possibility of suffering ; so that he had no 
desire which could lead him astray at all, no freedom 
to go astray, but by his organization was bound fast to 
the actual, — would be a better state of things ? Nc- 
body thinks so. 

Suppose this unprogressive and painless creature 
elevated to the highest degree of our present civilization 
— to the intellectual condition of the philosophers who 
make up the Academies of Paris, of Berlin, and of 
London ; surrounded with all the circumstances which 
suit that stage of development ; as fully satisfied as the 
oyster, and as incapable of any progress — individual or 
generic; — incapable of pain; without freedom of fur- 
ther development ; by his organization bound fast to the 
actual, no ideal beauty — intellectual, moral, affectional, 
or religious, — hovering about his head ; and that an 
undisturbed satisfaction filled up the consciousness of 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



299 



man. Would that be a better state of things than the 
present condition of Germany, France, and England — 
better as a finality than the present as a stage of pro- 
gress in the ever unfolding growth of man ? No 
thinker will think so. For those philosophers are as 
far from a full enjoyment of all the powers of their 
human nature almost as the Bushmans. 

We are made with a nature which demands contin- 
ual progress ; the instinct of development is amazingly 
powerful in the race. Mankind is not content to stand 
still, stopping at the Bushman's elevation, or at the 
stage where the modern philosopher gathers into his 
comprehensive mind the riches of present human con- 
sciousness. The Ideal haunts the human race and 
through eminent tongues calls out to man continually, 
" Onward, onward." All advance is progression by 
experiment; many an attempt fails of its end — the 
human child is borne with pain. But who is there that 
does not see that man has a higher, nobler destiny than 
the creatures which have no freedom, — bound to the 
present ? 

Suppose man made capable of progress, and — as 
finite — of experiments that fail, and yet incapable of 
pain. Would that be a good exchange ? Look at 
some examples. A man will not eat when he is hun- 
gry : suppose God by a transient miracle, or a perma- 
nent law forbid the pain which now comes from lack of 
food; the man would die of inanition, die without 
warning. Suppose he would eat when not hungry, or 
in excessive quantity, and no pain followed this viola- 
tion of the natural rule of temperance ; he would die of 
repletion, die unwarned of his peril. Suppose he would 
eat what was harmful, things not meant for human 
food ; would it be well if there were no disgust of any 



300 



PROVIDENCE. 



sense, to notify the man before the mistake, no torture 
in any member to warn him of the error ? Would it be 
well to have an amount of pain not adequate to remind 
him of the peril ? 

"What if a man would not work even for the most 
needful things ; and God, like a foolish mother, to spare 
him the present consequences of laziness, either by 
special fleeting miracles, or by general and permanent 
law, gave him all the desirable outward things which 
now come from the long-continued toil of men. What 
if all things came at his desire ; he 

" — need but wish and instantly obeyed, 
Fair ranged the dishes rose and thick the glasses played ! " 

Why what a world it would be, where " wishes were 
horses and beggars might ride ; " a universal lubber- 
land, peopled by beggars on horseback riding after then- 
proverbial wont! If man lived he would be a suckling 
for ever, never attaining the dignity of stripling. But 
he would not live, thus conditioned only by his wishes. 
This suckling of caprice, like a kite without a string, 
would soon come to the ground, unwarned by any pain 
till death finished him. A child not conditioned by its 
parents, is a spoiled child, father and mother only spe- 
cial providences of ruin. A school of children with no 
schoolmaster to regulate them with " Thou shalt," and 
" Thou shalt not," what a hurly-burly is it of most un- 
profitable going which yet goes nowhere ! A young 
man suddenly made master of an unexpected fortune, 
and so presented with the freedom of riches he had 
never won, is always brought thereby in great peril, 
and commonly finds the excessive fortune a misfor- 
tune. 

Imagine men so active that they will toil all the 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIX. 



301 



time, and neither rest nor sleep ; would it be wise and 
well to leave them with no possibility of pain to warn 
them before the frame lay there worn out and dead ? 
Suppose they wrought by night and not by day, would 
it be an improvement on the present state of things if 
no inconvenience and no pain attended the capricious 
violation of Nature's law, until death ended the mistake ? 

Suppose a man worked at the right time and in the 
right proportion, but worked wrong, against the nature 
of things ; that he planted his pear-trees with the roots 
up and the branches down ; or set the roots in husks of 
corn, in straw, in dried moss, in the feathers of birds, or 
the hair of beasts ; and made his own bed out of moist 
rich earth, every night covering up his limbs in that 
Suppose God should alter the constitution of things to 
suit our man, so that his accommodating pear-tree grew 
and bore fruit, the roots up, the branches down, or grew 
out of husks and hay, hair and feathers ; and that his 
body did not suffer from sleeping wrapped up in garden 
mould; that the pear and the man changed beds ca- 
priciously and God made the world accommodate the 
silly whim : would that be an improvement, better than 
the present rule — " as you make your bed so you must 
He ? » 

What if a man put things to the wrong use — mak- 
ing wheaten bricks of the corn he grew, piling them 
into walls for his house, and roofing over this paste- 
board palace with tiles of bread ; would it be a misfor- 
tune if the next storm soaked through his roof and 
walls, and brought this whole mass of unleavened 
bread upon the head of its maker ? 

"What if he made his bread of wood and sand and 
clay, not of corn, and God interfered with our booby 
and allowed him to suffer no pain for his stupidity ?. 

26 



302 



PROVIDENCE. 



Would that be a good plan ? What a school the world 
would be with no regulation but the finite caprice of 
each John and Jane ! 

If a man provides the proper articles for food and 
shelter, but gets them in insufficient quantity, or of a 
quality which will soon perish, or lives in a spot which 
is unhealthy ; would it be well for God to twist the 
material world so as to accommodate the human folly 
and let him off with a whole skin ? Should you think 
the world well made if it altered to suit the caprice of 
each man in it ; and if every whimsey had a universal 
right of way over all the world — Nature a " servitude " 
to nonsense ! If a man makes a cart to carry himself 
and his chattels from place to place, and makes it ill, or 
drives it badly, if it breaks down when overloaded, or 
turns over when one wheel is driven into a ditch and 
the other into the air, and if the man be hurt and his 
goods spilled out, is there a flaw in the world, think you, 
because he suffers chagrin at the failure, and pain by 
the bruise ? When his carriage, ill made, overladen, 
driven badly, was about to overturn, suppose its owner 
prayed to all the saints in heaven, you would not think 
it a kindness in the Infinite God to alter the laws of 
Nature to suit this ill conduct of a cart. Would you 
have the man turn out for gravitation, or have God 
push the planet to the wall to let our lubber's cart 
go by? 

A boy makes a kite with a frame of iron, and planks 
it over with live-oak. The thing would sink in water ; 
shall God alter the constitution of the world and make 
it float in air ? or leave the boy to profit by his chagrin, 
and try till he learns the laws of Nature and makes a 
kite to correspond ? If a man gets displeased with this 
planet and wishes to ride round the sun in his own gig. 



THE ECONOMY 01 PAIN. 



303 



is God to pave the road and furnish him a horse ? 
Shall God give the new moon to every baby who cries 
for it ? The girl pricks her fingers in learning to sew — 
shall God make the hand as senseless as the needle to 
spare little miss the use of her wits ? 

A man sails the sea, he gets a poor and leaky ship, 
ill moulded, ill built, ill 'rigged, and overloaded too, 
manned and mastered badly; he takes no pains to learn 
the coast he sails from, or to ; little care to look out for 
rocks, or shoals, but drives up towards land, all heed- 
less, in a storm ; then, when Ins crazy hulk is in immi- 
nent peril, he and his miserable crew — - all ignorant and 
half drunk — for safety pray lustily to God. Is it a 
hard thing that he gets the ocean for answer ; that his 
planks go to pieces and he is strangled hi the deep ; or 
if with much ado he treads the waters under him and 
comes alive to land, has he a right to complain of hard 
usage because the fatherly Providence did not empty 
the waters out of the sea to save a foolish man the 
trouble of thinking ? 

In making the world, what if God had fashioned it 
so that shipwreck was impossible ; that when a vessel 
approached a rock, of her own accord she wore off, or 
tacked and stood away ; that it was needless for the 
mariner to study navigation, or seamanship, or the ait 
of building ships, but every tub would sail perfectly, 
vdth any requisite speed and burthen, and find its own 
way to any destined haven ; so that you need only write 
thereon, " Bound for London," and put off from land, 
and the craft found its way there as surely as a stone 
to the bottom of a well when dropped in at the top ; 
that a mariner need take no thought at all, for God 
tempered the wind to the sailor self-shorn of his wits ! 
Would that be so good a scheme as the present one 



304 



PROYIDEXCE. 



which demands stout ships — built with all the art of 
human science to correspond with the Nature which 
God has made, — prudent masters, careful men, a com- 
pass in the binnacle, a chart and chronometer in the 
cabin, light-houses along the coast, scrutinizing survey- 
ors to scan the heavens, to search the bosom of the sea 
and learn to trace the footsteps of the storm and so be 
served by wind and tide, by star and sea and land ? 
The shipwreck brings loss of goods and loss of life, pain 
to full many a heart ; but you see what all this suffering 
means. If I, standing on the shore, saw a vessel about 
to go to pieces in a storm, dashed on a rock, had I the 
power, doubtless in my human weakness and ignorance, 
I should rend the rock in sunder, or should chide the 
sea, and hold it back e'er it should swallow down the 
ship, strangling such hopeful life. But at the creation 
the Infinite God knew all the powers of the sea, the 
storm, the future ship, the men therein ; foreknew their 
history, and doubtless arranged all well. For answer 
to our special prayers comes the eternal action of the 
universal law. Thus we learn by the elements ; the 
winds are our ministers, the sea not only a constant 
ferryman, that huge St. Christopher, fetching and carry- 
ing from land to land, but a teacher also. Yea all 
Nature is a " Schoolmaster to bring us to Christ." 

What sufferings have we seen of late years on emi- 
grant ships, crowded with passengers without fire, water, 
or even air, heedless, ill-fed, unclean ? What if God 
" interposed " at the prayer of some mortal and allowed 
no man to suffer from cold, hunger, or ship-fever ! 
Would that be better than to leave man to suffer till 
the nations learned the laws of Nature, and enforced 
them by statutes of their own, and then came safe 
across the sea, not sick, not cold, not wet ? God makes 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



305 



the elements as perfect Cause, administers them as 
perfect Providence, and made the mind of man one 
element whereby to work out human welfare. Shall 
not that factor perform its function ? 

Men build iron roads, and put thereon a train of iron 
cars, drawn by the iron horse. The axles are iron, the 
wheels iron ; the friction is great, the draught is diffi- 
cult, the metal wears out. What chagrin of engineers, 
what complaint of shareholders ! Shall God, by per- 
manent law, or fleeting miracle, alter the constitution 
of things to abate the friction ; or leave men to study 
the structure of their own limbs, and make an artificial 
cartilage of compounded metals, and moisten it with 
such synovial liquor as science can devise, and so save 
the wear and tear of then machine ? If a stone gets 
in the boy's shoe, shall God all at once soften the stone, 
or harden the foot; or shall he leave the boy to suffer 
till he shakes the annoyance from his own shoe and 
walks off erect and easy? If God give adequate in- 
tellect at first, is he to supersede the necessity of using 
it? What a Providence that would be, at cross pur- 
poses with itself! 

Here is a lazy young man, yet very exorbitant ; he 
wants the power of riches, the honor of office, the en- 
joyment of high culture — the distinction of all the 
three ; but he devotes himself only to his moustache, his 
cigar, and his dress. Is it the fault of Providence that 
he continues a most uncomfortable dunce, neither re- 
spected nor respectable ; that he is full of pain and 
i chagrin, and walks the street with the air of a dys- 
peptic pirate, complaining of "the ingratitude of re- 
publics " and talking of suicide ? Would it be a good 
thing if God made money to drop miraculously into 
his idle hands, crowned him with office, and gave him 

26* 



306 



PROVIDENCE. 



the culture which earnest men elaborate so slow by pain- 
ful thought ! Would it be kind in fact to the grumbler 
himself? A foolish mother would give him all these 
things, unconditioned ; the dear God says, " What 
would you have ? Pay for it and take it." No spoiled 
children with the Infinite Mother ! If Themistocles feels 
chagrin, and cannot sleep a-nights for thinking of the 
trophies of Miltiades, shall God come and rock the 
cradle of this great Athenian baby ; or let him lie awake 
till he grows up a great Athenian man ! 

Some men add to then family more than they can 
feed, shall God turn stones to bread to stop their 
mouths ? It rains pottage ; Esau will not hold up his 
dish. Shall God make rain come the other way, to 
please the lout? What a world it would soon be, 
each hairy Esau turning out a whining clown, not a 
valiant hunter, the world a fool's paradise, where be- 
twixt man and God it was always " Hail fellow ! well 
met." 

If a nation does not work, or works wrong, — brew- 
ing its corn into beer, not baking it into bread, producing 
rum and tobacco, not houses and cloth ; if it applies to 
a wrong purpose its sea-chariots, or land-chariots ; will 
build forts and not cities, breed soldiers and " nobles," 
not farmers and mechanics, — loaf-consumers, or de- 
stroyers of loaves, not loaf-makers — has the nation a 
right to complain against God for its want of bread ? 
Or when complaining with many prayers, shall God 
send a miracle to feed the men, not leave them to hun- 
ger till their own hands stop their mouth ? If half the 
people are left uncared for by the powerful class and 
turn out badly, steal, rob, and murder, knowing no bet- 
ter, have the men who have been careless a right to 
complain at the result ? Nay when all African Hayti 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



307 



rises " in blackest insurrection," what right has the 
master to complain ? 

Not long ago there was a famine in Ireland. It was 
thought a most hideous famine even in that land where 
hunger is the constant condition. England kept a day 
of fasting and prayer, asking God to " interpose, and 
withdraw his hand ! " Ah me ! The prayer was sadly 
unwise and sounded irreverent. Had the Father med- 
dled unwisely with his world ? The good God had 
done no wrong ; his hand is never out of place. The 
famine came in mercy to man ; England had op- 
pressed Ireland, pushed the Irish to the brink of ruin, 
and did not seem to care much how soon they went 
over. The Irish had not planted corn, nothing but the 
potatoe. And that would decay ; not all at once, but 
little by little. Long years ago the potatoe prophesied, 
rising early and warning men whether they would hear 
or forbear : " I am not fit to be a nation's bread. If you 
do not learn the lesson, why I shall rot in the ground, 
and you will starve above it ! " That was the word of 
the Lord by the mouth of his servant Potatoe. No 
prophet ever spoke plainer, neither Trojan Cassandra, 
nor Elias the Tishbite. He spoke to deaf ears. The 
many were too ignorant, or feeble ; the few too idle, or 
selfish, to heed the word. So after the oracle came the 
history, and then the lamentation, the fasting and the 
prayer. In other lands, here in America, the potato 
also failed, but men died not in consequence ; they had 
bread to eat and lived on. What did the famine mean ? 
It spoke plainly as tongue could tell, " Grow more and 
better food ; eat and live, Oh ye Irishmen ! for why will 
ye die ? " 

Not many centuries ago there was a famine every 
ten or twenty years in the most refined nation of Eu- 



308 



PROVTBEXCE. 



rope, — there were ten dreadful famines in France in a 
single century. The priests prayed, and said " the 
world is coming to an end. God is angry because you 
do not come to mass, you unbelievers, you ! He will 
starve you to death ; and then torture you in hell." But 
the prayer brought no bread. Shall the prophet wait for 
the crow to feed him ? The feeding will be of ravens, 
not prophets. Whence came the famine ? Men had 
fought each other instead of conquering the forces of 
Nature ; had raised soldiers, not farmers and clothiers. 
The famine warned them of their error, — a painful 
warning, but the misery not excessive. It sowed 
wheat. 

A little while ago there came the cholera, scaring the 
world. Men attributed it to the " wrath of God ; " beg- 
ged that dear Father " to withdraw his hand," thinking 
him meddlesome and ill-tempered! Men had been 
ignorantly violating some of the natural conditions of 
bodily well-being, nay of bodily existence. If we went 
on so we should all perish and the race die out. The 
disease brought pain and death, plainly telling us of 
our mistake and our consequent danger ; bidding us 
avoid the special cause of that mischief. Would it 
have been well for the Infinite Providence to alter for 
our caprice the Constitution of the Universe and the 
preestablished harmony between Nature and the frame 
of man ? The public prayers changed not the pur- 
poses of God, nor his motive, nor his means. But 
the board of health swept the cholera out of many a 
town. 

Man is sick, he prays for health. Shall God abolish 
the pain, or leave man to find out and remove the 
causes of his body's grief and seek medicine to palliate 
the disorder — while 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



309 



" In every path 
He treads down that which doth befriend him 
"When sickness makes him pale and wan ! " 

All these forms of pain and misery are clearly of a 
remedial character, and come to warn us of a mistake, 
to drive us from error before we are ruined. Without 
the pain, we should have been yet more pained. If 
our request could be granted without the fulfilment of 
the natural condition thereof, it would send leanness 
into our souls. 

" To hare my aim : and yet, to be 
Further from it, than when I bent my bow — 
To make my hopes, my torture : and the fee 

Of all my woes another woe — 
Is in the midst of delicates to need, 
And e'en in Paradise to be a weed." 

The pain we feel at the premature death of our asso- 
ciates is of the same character. Old age, I take it, is 
the only natural death for man. That we never mourn 
at, nor regard as evil. My father, a hale man of three- 
score, laid in the ground his own mother, fourscore and 
twelve years old. She went thither gladly, with no an- 
guish, no fear, with little pain ; went as a tall pine tree 
in the woods comes to the ground at the touch of a 
winter wind, its branches heavy with snow, its trunk 
feeble, its root sapless, worn-out, and old. He shed no 
tears, he was not sorry that the shock of corn fully 
ripened on earth was, in due time, gathered to Heaven. 
He need not mourn ; he should not mourn. It was the 
course of Nature ; and the child piously buried the ven- 
erable, hoary head of his mother, long knocking at the 
gate, and asking to be let through. But if he lost a 
child it was a sad day, a dark year; for the child 



310 



PROVIDENCE. 



perished immature. Sadly in June or July the gardener 
sees his unripe apples scattered on the ground, disap- 
pointing his hopes of harvest. But when 

" An apple, waxing over mellow, 
Drops in some autumn night," 

he only rejoices that Nature's ways come rounding to 
, their appropriate end. When the father buries the 
child, the mourning Rachel, refusing to be comforted, 
shows there is a mistake somewhere ; the pain warns 
us thereof before we all perish. 

This seems to be the meaning and the merciful use 
of the grief we feel at laying down our dear ones im- 
mature, when these leaves of our tree are shattered 
" before the mellowing year." At the present day such 
is the state of medical science that the Doctors of Med- 
icine know almost as little of man's body as the Doc- 
tors of Divinity know of his spirit. Between disease 
and the doctor there is a wall, thick and high, with here 
and there a loophole which some scientific man has 
made. Men look through and see dimly in spots ; and 
pass through some medicines and advice, to palliate 
the mischief a little. The pain we feel when our friends 
die an unnatural death ; our own reluctance to depart 

— life's duties not half done, nor half its joys possessed ; 

— the sympathy which all men feel with those that 
suffer thus, making another's misery our own, — these 
drive us to break down that wall, to cure the disease, to 
learn the law of health, that all may ride in sound 
bodies the stage of mortal life, check the steeds at the 
proper bound, dismount from the flesh, and continue 
our journey in such other chariot as God provides for 
the ascension. 

A child plays on the edge of a rock ; the mother 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



311 



creeps up stealthily, and suddenly plucks away the ro- 
mantic boy loving to look down into the deep darkness. 
Pain comes on the same motherly errand. Shall God 
let us fall in, not warned of the pit ? 

The terrible diseases which sweep off half the human 
race before they count three summers and those which 
decimate the ranks of adult men, are a warning to man- 
kind showing that we live unwisely yet. The result 
of the pain we suffer is a continual effort to live wiser, 
better, longer, and so the term of human life contin- 
ually crows more and more. 

All the pain and misery of the character thus far 
spoken of, are plainly medical and benevolent. If it 
did not hurt the hands to burn, or freeze them, who of 
us would grow up with a finger ? If feet did not smart 
with abuse, they would be treated as shoes, worn out in 
childhood, and no hardy boy would have a foot left. 
If broken teeth did not ache, so long as walnuts have a 
shell, no child would be safe ; the world would be full 
of toothless striplings. The pain of poverty and want, 
of ignorance, of disappointed ambition, of affections 
bereaved or disappointed in a sadder sort ; of the acci- 
dents to individuals by flood and field, to nations by 
war ; of the diseases which prey upon mankind — the 
rats and mice of the world's housekeeping, — it all has 
this meaning and this use. See with what scorpion 
whips Poverty drives the Irishmen out of Ireland ; and 
pursues them in America, forcing them to work and 
think. The American beggar hears the lash which 
once he felt, and avoids the*blow. In half a century we 
shall see the result — the Irishmen will be also indus- 
trious, thoughtful, well-fed, well-clad. , Men run trains 
of railroad cars together, or attempt to pass a river 



312 



PROVIDENCE. 



when the drawbridge is up ; and there is the wreck of 
matter and the crush of men. The remedy for the pain 
is at hand. The great annual destruction of human 
life in America, by the carelessness of men who control 
the land and water carriages wherein the public ride, is 
a warning against our folly ; the evil perfectly within 
our own control. All these things must needs have 
been foreseen. | The attendant pain is the perpetual 
check on human caprice, the constant of Nature which 
controls our variable whim. 

See how pain occasioned by loss of friends, with the 
wide sympathy it calls out, forces us to study the laws 
of health, to cure the sick, to keep men sound. Famine 
makes men creative to produce, and prudent to spare. 
The cholera teaches temperance and cleanliness, which 
once the plague bid mankind learn. Every case of 
typhoid warns us of broken law ; a shipwreck rings the 
bell to notify us to have stouter vessels, or have them 
better sailed, with fitter apparatus on board, and better 
beacons on the coast. If men are too indolent, and 
will not rule themselves, the tyrant binds on his burdens, 
which grow more and more difficult to be borne. The 
suffering from bad political institutions in Naples, Spain, 
Hungary, and all the world, is not more than sufficient 
to warn mankind, to make them seek out and avoid the 
cause of smart. A nation like a man, shivers long at 
night, before it gets courage to rise, to hew wood, to 
build a fire and so be warm again. Is the pain of 
Europe at this day too great for this end ? The frost 
does not yet bite sharp enough to wake mankind fr om 
savage sleep. Before us Pain, a flitting messenger, 
hurries to warn us ; behind stands Misery to drive. 
But the one warms us from our bale ; the other drives 
us to our bliss. 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN". 



313 



If we pursue the inductive course as far as we can 
see, and then follow the way of deduction from the 
Idea of the Infinite God, to this conclusion must we 
come at last — that the present physical pain and 
misery in the world of animals and men is not an 
Absolute Evil ; quite far from it, it is a partial Good ; 
that it is disciplinary, preparing us for the Ultimate and 
Absolute Good. 

But after all this is clearly made out, it must still be 
confessed that there are millions of men who from no 
conscious evil of their own suffer a great deal of mis- 
ery, and pass out of life apparently unrecompensed ; — 
the men who are cut off in early life, tortured by dis- 
ease, stung by poverty, sacrificed to the purposes of the 
race, and leave their lesson to others ; men disappointed 
in their tenderest affections ; those whose hearts are so 
sadly bereaved that they go mourning all their days. 
For the negative, or positive, evil they suffer here, the 
only adequate compensation must come in another 
state of being, beyond the grave. I know not the 
means, no man knows ; perhaps no man can ever know 
in this life. But as God is Infinite ; and creates all 
from a perfect motive, of perfect material, for a perfect 
purpose, and as a perfect means thereto, it is absolutely 
certain that the ultimate welfare of each animal or 
human creature must at last be made sure. This does 
not follow from any of the finite conceptions of Deity — 
from Jupiter or Zeus, from the Jehovah of the Old 
Testament, or the God of the popular theology ; but it 
follows unavoidably from the idea of the Infinite God.. 
As a fluent point generates a line, so the Infinite God 
generates blessedness, and ever blessedness, and only 
blessedness. So all the pain and misery God's crea- 

27 



314 



PROVIDENCE. 



tures suffer, must one day be abundantly repaid. It 
was all foreseen and provided for by hirn 

" Who is of all Creator and Defence." 

as a part of his scheme, here a resultant of necessi- 
tated force, there the contingent of individual freedom 
acting in contact with other forces. But in both cases 
must it be perfectly provided for. This is as certain as 
that one and one make two. For as the last conclusion 
of a geometric demonstration follows unavoidably from 
the axioms of mathematic science and the data of the 
problem, so ultimate, complete, and perfect Welfare fol- 
lows from the Infinite Perfection of God. He has 
made pain and misery part of the discipline of this life ; 
it must have been in infinite benevolence that he did so. 
Mankind is doubtless saved by present suffering from 
suffering worse. Not by the pains of Jesus, but its 
own is mankind saved. Our own pain and misery are 
educational discipline ; if the roots of culture be bitter, 
doubtless the blossom will be fair and fragrant, and the 
final fruit sweet to our soul. The pain and misery 
which others suffer from ignorance, and causes beyond 
their own control, help teach us charity ; the time, the 
means, the effort we expend in their behalf is often 
so much devoted to our highest culture, — the educa- 
tion of Conscience, of the Affections, yea, of the Soul 
Y\iiich by nature turns to God. 

Now then where is the Absolute Evil of Pain and 
Misery of this character ? There is none such ! Two 
angels, archangels if men will name them such — 
Gabriel and Michael, — come to warn us ; not excep- 
tions to God's Providence, ministers thereof, they come 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



315 



to man and bird and beast, on the same errand of be- 
nevolence — to warn us of a mistake ; not angels with 
a flaming sword turning every way to keep us from the 
Tree of Life ; angels they are who walk between us 
and the Tree of Death to keep man from the Upas of 
ruin. 

If the universe were to end to-day, it would seem a 
failure, for now only the spring-time of the world's long 
year is present, and man goes forth, ignorant and weep- 
ing, and with pain scatters seeds which one day, all and 
each, are to bear manifold the bounteous harvest of im- 
mortal joy. But all around us seems made for stable 
duration, and is auspicious of a glorious future for 
mankind on earth. The coldest of men feel deeply 
and by instinctive nature, that the misery of the world 
is only a pain, of growth not of decay. 

" Slight symptoms these ; but shepherds know 
How hot the mid-day sun shall glow 
From the mists of morning sky." 

I have often asked you to notice how the material 
forces of Nature work together, how wisely they are 
distributed ; how beautiful are its statical and dynami- 
cal laws ; how wonderfully Centripetal and Centrifugal, 
those two strong horses of the Almighty, sweep this 
earthly chariot through the sky ; how chemical and vital 
forces serve the economy of the Universe, and how the 
minimum of means produces the maximum of end 
therein. Yet even there, in Nature, we see but little of 
the whole, and know but little of what we see. Things 
yet uncomprehended continually appear. It is but 
a single page in Nature's book we have learned to 
read. 

So far as human science reaches it is plain that the 



SERMON X. 

OF PROVIDENCE — THE ECONOMY OF MORAL ERROR. 

(319) 



ECCLESIASTICUS XLH. 24. 

HE HATH MADE NOTHING IMPERFECT. 

(320) 

■ / 



X. 



THE ECONOMY OF MORAL ERROR UNDER THE 
UNIVERSAL PROVIDENCE OF GOD. 



Last Sunday I spoke of one form of Evil, of the 
physical Pain and Misery in the World of Animals 
and Men, which come from violating the physical con- 
ditions of welfare ; designing to show the Function 
and Economy thereof in the Providence of God. To- 
day I wish to speak of the other form of Evil, of the 
Pain and Misery which comes from violating other con- 
ditions of welfare ; of Moral Error and Sin, with their 
consequences ; designing to show the Function and 
Economy thereof in the Providence of God. The two 
departments of inquiry are lands, lying side by side, in- 
distinctly separated, locking into each other by many 
plies and folds, so that the stream which rises in one 
runs into the other, and it is difficult, perhaps impossi- 
ble, in all cases to say where one begins and the other 
ends, so indistinct are the boundaries. In both these 
sermons I often cross the lines. 

In Theological Ethics there are some broad distinc- 
tions of things, marked by corresponding distinctions 
of language, which ought to be borne in mind. Here 

(321) 



322 



PROVIDENCE. 



are some of the terms I shall use in a technical sense in 
this sermon. 

A mistake is the violation of some Rule of Correct- 
ness, or of Expediency. To do inexpediently is a mis- 
take. It produces an experiment which fails, because 
the calculation on which it is founded is incorrect. Jehu 
would go from Bethany to Jerusalem ; he misconceives 
the way, takes the wrong road, comes out at Bethlehem 
instead and loses his journey. 

A mistake has its origin in an intellectual deficiency, 
a lack of knowledge. It may be a lack of knowledge 
in general — Jehu never knew the way from Bethany to 
Jerusalem ; or a lack of knowledge at that special 
time — he had forgotten, he had not his wits about 
him, he did not take heed to his ways, and so he lost 
his journey. It may come from a lack of general intel- 
lectual power. Thus a fool mistakes stones for bread. 
There are men of weak minds, who do not discern 
clearly by their intellect ; or whose intellectual percep- 
tions do not much influence their will and then con- 
duct, — simpletons, idiots, fools, in respect to power of 
mind, they often make mistakes through lack of wit. 

Mistakes of this sort are often called Errors ; and so 
men speak of " errors of the press," " errors of longi- 
tude," " errors of calculation," and the like. In such 
cases in this sermon, I will use the word Mistake, to 
reserve the term " Error " for another and strictly tech- 
nical use. 

An Error is the unconscious and involuntary viola- 
tion of some Rule of Right, of the Moral Law of God. 
It is to the Conscience what a mistake is to the intel- 
lect — it is a moral mistake, as a mistake is an intel- 
lectual error. To do unjustly is an Error, as to do in- 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



323 



expediently is a Mistake. One violates the Rule of 
Right, the other the Rule of Expediency. Every Error 
is also a mistake, for what is really wrong is always par- 
tially and ultimately inexpedient ; but every Mistake is 
not also an Error. Jehu did no moral wrong by mis- 
taking the high road to Bethlehem for that to Jerusalem. 

Here is an example of Error : the ill-bred boys steal 
apples from Ahab's garden ; to correct them he shuts 
the offenders up in jail with old and accomplished 
rogues, where they grow worse by their confinement ; 
the well-meant correction wrongs and worsens the boys. 
He has violated a moral law of God, the natural rule of 
right, seeking to overcome the evil in them by another 
evil out of them, setting his vengeance against their 
trespass. But he did this unconsciously and involun- 
tarily : he did not know there was such a natural law ; 
he had no intention of doing wrong ; he knew no better 
way to guard his orchard and correct the young ma- 
rauders. 

Error comes from deficiency of moral power — gen- 
eral, or special, from a lack of moral knowledge : Ahab 
never knew the Rule of Right which applies to such 
cases, that justice is the medicine for injustice, love for 
hate, and good for evil ; or he had forgotten, and did 
not recollect it at the time ; or, if he did, his general 
human conscience was borne down by his special and 
particular sense of the loss ; and for a time it seemed as 
if he had never known any better. There are men of 
weak conscience — such as do not discern morally, or 
whose moral perceptions do not much influence their 
will, — moral simpletons, moral idiots, moral fools. 
They often commit Errors, as feeble children stumble, 
and mouths ill-formed stammer and cannot talk. 



324 



PROVIDENCE. 



A Crime is a Violation of some Human Statute — 
some positive rule of conduct laid down by the govern- 
ment. To do illegally is a crime. Thus it is a crime 
in Boston to drive a wagon on the left hand side of the 
street, in Berlin on the right hand side. In the District 
of Columbia it is a crime to harbor or conceal a slave 
who has run away from one of the Barbary States of 
America ; in the District of Tunis it is a crime not to 
harbor and conceal a slave who has run away from one 
of the Barbary States of Africa. In Boston it is a 
crime to take a white dollar which is not yours and ap- 
propriate it to your use, and the man who does this is 
put in jail ; while it is no crime, but a legal service, to 
take this black man, who belongs not to you, but to 
himself, and appropriate him to your use. The man 
who does such deeds is held in social and ecclesiastical 
honor. Christianity is a crime at Constantinople, Mo- 
hammedanism at Rome, and effective humanity shown 
to a black woman escaping from her " owner " in Car- 
olina, is a crime in Boston. To help Shadrach out of 
the hands of the man-stealers of Boston was the highest 
crime known to American law ; it was " levying war," 
treason, liable to be punished with death ; in Halifax it 
would be the fulfilment of the golden rule and rendering 
a service unto Jesus Christ. To protect Ellen Craft 
while kidnappers were clutching at her life, was a crime 
in New England ; in old England it is an honor. If a 
man in this city should seize and force into bondage 
Cuban negroes escaping hither from a monarchic fetter, 
he would commit a crime : but there are persons here 
whose official and legal function it is to seize and force 
into bondage American negroes, escaping hither from a 
democratic fetter ; commissioned for that very purpose. 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



325 



To kill an unoffending man for your own personal pleas- 
ure or profit in Massachusetts, is a crime ; in New 
Zealand it is a matter of common practice. The pro- 
fessional man-butcher has a legal existence in New 
Zealand, I am told, as much as the professional man- 
stealer in Boston. It is a crime to resist either in his 
local function. 

A Crime may be a mistake ; or it may be an error, 
for the human statute violated may represent the nat- 
ural rule of expediency, or of right : or it may be nei- 
ther an error, nor a mistake ; for the human statute vio- 
lated, may itself be both inexpedient and unjust as in 
the acts establishing the man-butcher at New Zealand 
and the man-stealer at Boston. It is no function of the 
official executors of the statute to inquire whether it 
corresponds to the Rule of Right. The judge and the 
hangman are to be just as active in punishing a man 
for rescuing Shadrach from the kidnappers, as in pun- 
ishing the worst of pirates, red all over with human 
blood ; for such officers are of law, not Justice, and a 
crime is an Offence against Law whether just or un- 
just. 

A Sin is a conscious and voluntary or wilful violation 
of a known law of God. To do wickedly is a Sin. 
This does not come from lack of intellectual perception, 
nor from lack of moral perception ; but from an unwil- 
lingness to do the known Right, and a willingness to do 
the known Wrong. It comes from some other defi- 
ciency, a compound deficiency — from lack of affec- 
tional power, or of religious power, or from a perverse 
will. 

Here is an example: Henry honestly owes John a 
talent of gold, and can pay him, but will not, though 

28 



326 



PROVIDENCE. 



John needs the money. The Non-payment is a nega- 
tive Sin. William knows it is naturally wrong to steal, 
he is rich and has no material occasion to make stealing 
excusable, but he robs Dorcas, a poor unprotected seam- 
stress. The Theft is a positive Sin. 

Sin is a violation of the Rule of Right ; and so is 
distinguished from a Mistake. It is conscious and vol- 
untary ; and so is distinguished from an Error. It is a 
violation of a Natural Law of God ; and is thus distin- 
guished from a Crime. 

I might discriminate a little more nicely and make a 
distinction between a Subjective Sin — which is a con- 
scious violation of what is thought to be a natural law, 
but is not ; and an Objective Sin, a conscious violation 
of what is a natural law. In each case the integrity of 
consciousness is disturbed. 

So much for the definition of terms. 

There may be various Degrees of Error and of Sin. 
It is not easy to say where one begins and the other 
ends ; for in ethics as in all science, it is not easy to 
distinguish things by their circumferences, where they 
blend, but only by their centres, where the difference is 
most clearly marked. 

It is sometimes said there can be no such Error, or 
Sin, as I speak of. This is one doctrine of that pan- 
theistic scheme, before mentioned, which appears in so 
many forms and under such antagonistic names. A 
natural law of God, it is asserted, can no more be vio- 
lated, consciously or unconsciously, by man than by 
matter. A Sin, therefore — in the meaning just affixed 
to that word — is as impossible as a solar eclipse at the 
time of full moon ; or as a straight line which is not the 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



327 



shortest distance between two points ; it is the law of 
God, and so the will of God that William should rob 
the seamstress, Henry neglect to pay John, and Ahab 
clap the boys into jail for pilfering his apples. 

The distinction between the normality of matter and 
the normality of man, if not obvious, is yet clear 
enough. In physical science we learn the law of mat- 
ter by seeing what is done ; it is derived from facts of 
observation ; by a natural intellectual process, from all 
the facts we know we gather the Law of the Facts, that 
is, the Natural Mode of Operation- of the material forces 
we study. Thus we know the law by seeing its ob- 
servance ; know it to be binding by seeing things bound 
by it, as far as we see at all. It is found solely by the 
inductive process, by observation and demonstration. 
It is an Idea which, so to say, rests always on two pil- 
lars of fact, — Facts of Observation, Facts of Demon- 
stration. There is no actual exception to the general 
law ; a single contrary fact would show us there was 
no such law as we supposed. In Nature the ideal and 
the actual are the same, — the ideal law and the actual 
fact. This is true in mathematics, true also in physics. 
Theory and practice are identical. 

In ethical science, we learn the law of human nature 
— that is the Natural Mode of Operation of the human 
forces in Thomas, or in mankind — not by observation 
and demonstration, but by an intuition of conscious- 
ness. The law is not a fact of observation or demon- 
stration, but of consciousness. It is just as much a 
law of human nature if Ahab, Henry, and "William 
have violated it all their lives, as if they had consciously 
complied therewith. If we merely take all the facts of 
observation made upon man and thence induce a law, 
we can only see what has worked well hitherto, and get 



328 



PROVIDENCE. 



an empirical knowledge of the expedient in time past ; 
the conclusion represents the facts of human history, 
not the facts of human nature ; it applies, at best, only 
to those faculties already developed and enjoyed, not 
to those others yet undeveloped. And of course our 
scheme of ethics will have the imperfections which be- 
long to the persons or actions, who furnish us the facts. 
The Ideal will not transcend the Actual, but be identi- 
cal with it. Man has uniformly exploitered woman ; 
the government, the people ; the strong, the weak ; " it 
is the natural ethical law of human nature that this 
should be so." That would be a fair conclusion from 
this mode of procedure. Indeed the atheist — who 
studies man in this way, — tells us it is so ; the consist- 
ent popular theologian, who follows the same course, 
assures us that we can get nothing better from " the 
light of Nature ; " that all higher ethics come only of 
" miraculous revelation." 

But by attending to the facts of consciousness, to the 
moral instincts ; and by the direct action of the moral 
faculties which do not follow, but anticipate, experi- 
ence, we learn from human nature, not merely from hu- 
man history. Thus we get knowledge of a law of hu- 
man nature which is an Ideal of Consciousness, though 
not yet the actual of experience. It is in a great meas- 
ure a matter of will whether we follow this law and 
realize this ideal or not. It is our duty to obey this 
ideal law when we know it ; consciously and wilfully 
to violate it is Sin. 

Philosophically to deny the possibility of this kind of 
Error and of Sin, you must deny either that there is 
any difference between Right and Wrong ; or else that 
man has any Freedom to choose between them. Some 
men have denied each ; but it appears to me that both 



THE ECONOMY OE PAIN. 



329 



are facts of consciousness. I feel conscious of a differ- 
ence and antagonism between Right and Wrong ; that 
is an ultimate fact of consciousness. The greater part 
of mankind feel the same thing, and have words to ex- 
press that fact. I feel conscious of freedom, to a cer- 
tain extent ; that also is an ultimate fact of conscious- 
ness. The greater part of mankind feel the same tiling. 
In a matter of this sort my own consciousness is of the 
utmost value to me ; the opinion of the human race has 
much weight, for this is one of the cases in which man- 
kind is a good judge. 

Now, much of the Pain and Misery in the world of 
man comes from a violation of the moral laws of Na- 
ture, from Error and Sin. Can this evil be reconciled 
with the Providence of the Infinite God ; or is it an 
Absolute Evil ? Let us first look at Error, then at Sin, 
at each with its consequences. 

In treating of the misery which comes therefrom, I 
will speak of it first, on a large scale — in its Political 
Form, of the Errors men make in their Civil Govern- 
ment. 

The natural moral law, in its political operation, 
requires that in the State there shall be complete and 
perfect National Unity of Action, — the nation being 
as complete a whole as a man's body, — that is neces- 
sary for all, that there may be a complete Whole ; and 
a complete and perfect Individual Variety of Action — 
each man doing just what he is fittest to do and can 
do best, — that is necessary for each man, that he may 
be a complete person, with free spiritual individuality, 
as free and independent in the State, as my hand and 

28* 



330 



PROVIDENCE. 



feet are in the body, and as much in his proper place 
and about his proper function. By this means there 
will be a combination of efforts, but a distribution of 
functions ; national unity of end and design with per- 
sonal diversity of means thereto. The centripetal power, 
the Government, and the centrifugal power, the Indi- 
vidual, will be combined into a cosmic harmony like 
that " which doth preserve the stars from wrong." 

This is the ethic ideal of a State, the political tool 
necessary to the welfare of mankind. Nothing short 
of that with its industrial and economical contrivances, 
will allow the individual all his natural and unalienable 
rights, and enable him to have the normal use, develop- 
ment, and enjoyment of every limb of his body and 
every faculty of his spirit. It is the political condition 
to complete human welfare. But there is not a nation 
in the world which has attained it yet. It is the ethic 
ideal of a State which the foremost men of the world 
are striving to set up. It can only be reached by the 
gradual development of human nature, which can take 
place only through progression by experiment. Some 
of the experiments will fail, through Mistakes — a viola- 
tion of the rule of expediency ; through Errors — a vio- 
lation of the rule of right, will fail in consequence of 
man's intellectual or moral weakness. If the failure is 
persisted in miseiy follows, and at length destruction ; 
the pain warns us of the blunder. 

Now I have not heard enough to show in all cases 
how this suffering proves remedial, and to demonstrate 
the perfect Providence of God in the history of man. 
For, to do that it would be necessary to have an amount 
of knowledge, both of human nature and of human 
history, which no man possesses as yet ; which perhaps 
it is not possible for mortal man ever to possess. But 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



331 



I can see the beneficent effect and tendency of this in 
so many cases, that the general analogy is clearly 
made out, even without recurring to the Idea of God 
as Infinite to "vindicate the ways of God to man." 
Yet without that Idea I confess I should feel little gen- 
eral confidence in such a vindication. 

Look at some of the examples of this kind of suffer- 
ing. Here are nations which eminently lack National 
Unity of Action. That is the case with all the govern- 
ments in Spanish America. The Hispano- Americans 
have not yet made a national harness which will hold 
all the people. Their political experiments have not 
succeeded very well. Their civil instrument is a poor 
tool, which works rather badly and hurts the nation's 
hand. As a consequence there follows a great deal 
of suffering ; the nations, each taken as a whole, are 
poor and weak; the individuals, taken separately, are 
also poor, ill-educated, oppressed, or oppressing, and not 
enjoying high modes of happiness. Their suffering is 
the consequence of their economical Mistakes and moral 
Errors. 

But how shall they ever get a better form of govern- 
ment ? Only by making the trial. And if they suffered 
no pain from the present failure they would make no 
effort for future success. The pain urges them con- 
tinually to alter and mend. They cannot be rich, happy, 
well educated, nor even tranquil, until they have this 
national Unity of Action. Hence they are in a state of 
continual disturbance and fermentation. Mexico alone 
has had twenty-seven revolutions in less than thirty 
years. Would it be a good thing if God were by mir- 
acle to remove this power to suffer on account of these 
causes ? Shall he miraculously give them a constitution 



332 



PROVIDENCE. 



and frame of government; and miraculously dispose 
all men to accept it ? That would be to treat those 
Creoles like mules and oxen, not like men. A woman 
wishes to walk cool in the summer's heat ; shall God 
miraculously give her the great shadow of a peculiar 
cloud, or leave her to make her own umbrella, and walk 
rejoicing in its shade ? 

Here are other nations which as eminently lack Indi- 
vidual Variety of Action — Spain, Italy, Austria, Tur- 
key, Russia, not to mention others. A great amount 
of force must be misdirected by the nation, as a whole, 
to keep the individuals in their unnatural condition : 
as a consequence there is a diminution of the productive 
power of the people as a whole — - soldiers and police- 
men so numerous, mechanics, merchants, farmers, so 
rare, — and accordingly the nations are poor, and ihe 
government unstable and corrupt. Individual men 
suffer from the unnatural restriction. This twofold 
misery is the unavoidable consequence of their political 
Error, it notifies men of the failure of their experiment. 
But the mischief can only be got rid of by making 
new political experiments. The national tool works 
badly, it hurts the hands of the People ; they must take 
it again to the forge, heat and warm it over anew in 
some other revolution and make a political instrument 
better suited to the work they wish to accomplish. 
Shall God alter the nature of man to accommodate the 
Spaniard, the Neapolitan, and the Turk, making human 
welfare to come from tyranny and ignorant exploitation 
of the People as well as from a wise and just frame of 
government ? Shall he miraculously prevent the anxiety 
of a tyrant, or the misery of his victim ? A woodman's 
axe is dull ; shall God alter the constitution of the 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



333 



trees, and increase the toughness of the woodman's 
arms ; or leave him to sharpen his axe, and then hew 
down the trees with more comfort ? 

Look at the human race as one person : from the 
beginning till now man has been devising an instru- 
ment to produce welfare. Every experiment has been 
a partial success, each also a partial failure. So far as 
the attempt succeeded the result has been delightful ; so 
far as it failed, painful. Suffering follows Error ; man 
abandons the Error, abolishes the mischief, tries again, 
making out better next time. The pain has only been 
adequate to sharpen his wits, like hunger and thirst to 
make him work in other forms. Thus man gets his po- 
litical education and political enjoyment. He tries des- 
potism — that tool does not please him ; then a mon- 
archy, then an aristocracy, then a republic, and improves 
continually in his constitutions as in his agricultural 
and military tools. Man in his political development 
hitherto has not suffered proportionately more than a 
little girl, under ordinary circumstances, in growing up 
to womanhood. But no one complains and thinks it an 
Absolute Evil that the wind sometimes blows off the 
hat of the little maiden; that she now and then falls 
down and soils her frock; that her hoop runs off the 
side-walk ; or that she fails to get the right conjunction 
in her French exercise and cries with chagrin at the 
recitations. Mankind, like little Miss, suffers from cor- 
responding evils, has the diseases of childhood, in a po- 
litical form. Anarchy, despotism, revolutions, — these 
are the measles and whooping-cough of the human race, 
one day to be outgrown. The present political condi- 
tion of mankind as much belongs to the present age of 
mankind and comes as naturally in the process of human 
development, I take it, as the greenness of apples be- 



334 



PROVIDENCE. 



longs to the month of June, and the immaturity of boy- 
hood to early years. Shall we complain that the boy is 
not born a man grown ; that the apple is not mature in 
June instead of October ? 

Political Oppression in its many forms is one of the 
worst evils which now afflict the enlightened nations. 
But it comes unavoidably from the nature of man — 
finite and progressive in his social as well as his indi- 
vidual condition. For human development it is neces- 
sary that men should gather in large masses, in nations ; 
to accomplish that political experiments are necessary ; 
the first attempt of a finite and free creature is not likely 
to succeed and produce the effect which is ultimately 
desirable ; the experiment may fail, and its failure must 
bring pain. Besides, man is politically progressive, and 
outgrows his institutions as the individual his baby- 
clothes. Those which pleased him once become a 
source of pain, no longer suiting the altered condition 
of the race. Here, as elsewhere, the pain is a warning. 

Sometimes we can see the particular good results 
brought about by some special evil. The Boston Port- 
Bill, the Stamp Act, with the other oppressive legisla- 
tions of England, hastened the separation of the Amer- 
ican child from her mother — to the lasting gain of both 
and also of the human race. A thinking man sees man- 
ifold examples of this sort in all the history of mankind, 
God 

" From seeming evil still educing good, 
And better thence again, and better still 
In infinite Progression." 

Suppose man had been made incapable of suffering 
from political Errors, when they came in the experi- 
ments of the race. The Hebrews would have been con- 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



335 



tent under the taskmasters of Egypt, and so have con- 
tinued slaves until they were degraded beyond possi- 
bility of elevation on earth : till they perished outright. 
If the Puritan had not smarted from the oppression he 
suffered, he would have borne it patiently till now ; and 
have become what despots love — a passive tool of 
tyranny ; the world would have lost the brave develop- 
ment of manhood which has come from that hardy 
stock. The horse and the ass are the servants of man ; 
they do not suffer from that state of subordination ; 
they take it 

'• With a patient shrug, — 
For sufferance is the badge of all the tribe," — 

and are content. Treat them kindly, give them enough 
to eat, do not overwork them, and you have done the 
beast no wrong. The dog is the only animal perhaps, 
who voluntarily puts himself under the protection of 
man. He does not suffer by human subordination ; it 
does not necessarily debase him, or prevent his develop- 
ment and his canine welfare. If his pliant nature yields 
to man's plastic hand, and takes new forms, his happi- 
ness has also new forms. " What a generosity and 
courage he will put on when he finds himself main- 
tained by a man, who is to him instead of a God, or 
Melior Natura ! " But man is debased by such subor- 
dination ; and' if he did not suffer and smart when 
another's will was imposed on him, the degradation 
would be ruin before he was aware of the peril. If he 
did not smart with pain under analogous thraldom, 
when treated well, well fed, well clad, and not over- 
worked, the nations had been slaves this day to a few 
men with minds full of mastery. 

The ruder a nation is, the less developed in the 



336 



PROVIDENCE. 



higher faculties, the more external force is necessary to 
keep individuals together and in order. But the less is 
such force debasing or painful to the sufferer. It re- 
quires more external force to establish national Unity 
of Action in Russia than in America; the constraint 
which a Russian needs and bears without pain, would 
be intolerable to a New Englander, or a Briton. 

Much misery appears in a Social Form, the conse- 
quence of Errors made in organizing men into commu- 
nities. The ethic ideal of society is an organization of 
men and women so skilfully constructed that each man 
shall do the normal work which he can do best, with 
the most advantage to himself and to all his fellows ; 
that he shall develop harmoniously all his faculties 
with entire natural freedom, and at the same time have 
the advantage of the aid and companionship of other 
men, all likewise doing their best thing. Here there 
will be a perfect Social Unity of Action and at the 
same time perfect Individual Variety of Action — nor- 
mal personal freedom. On the one hand, there will 
appear the Solidarity of Mankind, at least of the spe- 
cial community; on the other the Sacredness of the 
Individual. Each man will be deemed a Fraction of 
society and so a factor in its product, but also an In- 
teger ; and both the functions, that of the fraction and 
the integer will be sacredly respected. In this case the 
social usages, and the public opinion they rest on, will 
correspond exactly with the faculties of man in their 
actual state of development ; and with the natural 
moral laws of God. There will be the same blending 
of the centripetal power of the whole and the centrifu- 
gal power of the individual into that cosmic harmony 
which I spoke of before, whereby "the most ancient 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



337 



Heavens are fresh and strong." Then the various per- 
sons of the community will work together with as little 
friction as the Planets in their course ; with as little 
waste as the forces which form a rose or a lily. The 
laws, customs,, and habits of society will be just and 
natural. There will be no crime, — no man sacrificed 
to another man, or to the mass of men. There will be 
no pauperism because no laziness, no waste, and no 
rapacity : a diversity of functions, but concentric unity 
of purpose and a combination of efforts to achieve it. 
Every man will be in perfect harmony with himself, 
with his fellow men, and with Nature, — in perfect cir- 
cumstances. So he will be in perfect health both of 
body and spirit. Labor will be as delightful to men as 
to emmets, beavers, and robins building their nests : 
birth, life, death, all will be natural, all beautiful. Such 
is the ethic ideal of a community. Nothing less will 
correspond to the nature of man and the normal mode 
of action of the human powers ; nothing less to the 
social moral law of God. 

But there is no such community in the world ; there 
never has been. Behold what pain and misery come 
of our attempts to organize men ! A community is at 
present a jumble of human forces ; not a concord, but 
a discord. How many men are out of their natural 
sphere ! This man was born a hunter, but he sits un- 
easily on a shoemaker's bench all his life, dyspeptic and 
ill tempered. How many an idle profligate is cursed 
by the money which his ancestors gathered together, 
his riches hindering his manly development ! How 
many are covetous and grasping ! Think of the want 
and the crime ; think of the licentiousness and intem- 
perance ; of the sickness which cuts off such hosts of 
men in childhood, while only here and there one dies a 

29 



338 



PROYIDEXCE. 



natural death. Consider all the ghastly forms of irregu- 
lar action which you find in a great city, in Boston, 
New York, London. Think of the indispensable at- 
tendants of a great town — hospitals, asylums for the 
crazy and the old, for orphan babes, almshouses, jails of 
manifold denominations — the moral sewerage of the 
town, — of the police, swarming like buzzards in the 
streets to remove the refuse of mankind. The consta- 
ble never sleeps. The jail- van is always in motion. 
Law and crime jostle each other in all the street. Glut- 
tony and beggary meet at every corner. St. James and 
St. Giles glower at each other in Christian London. 
The angel of mercy follows the footsteps of the pros- 
titutes, and watches over the bedside of her brother 
who made them such. What pain and misery in 
modern society ! Boston is one of the most favora- 
ble specimens of a modern town, almost equally charita- 
ble and rich, but even here a good man can hardly walk 
the public streets and then repeat his private prayers 
without a shudder, — his heart making great leaps as 
he remembers the ignorance and misery about him. 

This suffering is an " abomination to the Lord," as 
much as the older heathen form of making children 
" pass through the fire unto Moloch ; " it is against the 
ideal of human nature. But if you look a moment you 
see the cause of the misery and its function. Man is 
finite, social, gifted with partial freedom, progressive 
also. Sociality on a large scale is indispensable to his 
development ; great cities are as necessary for mankind 
as a garment for a boy. They have ever been the fire- 
places of human education — intellectual, moral, and 
religious development. Man's advance in general de- 
velopment must take place by the aid, in part, of large 
combinations of men. To form them, nay, to group a 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



339 



hundred men together, he must make experiments. 
They may fail through Errors or Mistakes. Ail hu- 
man advance, social or individual, is progression by ex- 
periment. If men do not suffer from the failure they 
will not know it is a failure ; will continue it and 
perish. 

Suppose men made a social experiment and it failed 
in consequence of the intellectual or moral deficiency 
of the projectors, because it did not fulfil the economi- 
cal, or moral conditions of social well-being ; suppose 
we did not suffer pain from the consequences of this 
Mistake and Error, and consequently continued in it and 
never rectified what was amiss in our experiment ; 
would that be a better scheme than the present one ? 
It is as idle to grumble at Providence because men suf- 
fer from social Mistakes and Errors, as to find fault 
with God because a mill does not grind corn when its 
wheels are placed on the wrong side of the dam. I 
wish to write, but have put no ink in my pen. Shall 
God fill it for me miraculously ; or enable me to write 
with a dry quill ? He gave me the head and hand to 
furnish ink withal ; mankind the head and hand to 
organize communities aright. My disappointment and 
the world's misery notify us to take heed. 

When the social machine is so constructed that it 
provides shelter, food, raiment, education deficient in 
quality or in quantity, or distributes these needful 
things in an unnatural and therefore unsatisfactory 
manner, is it not a wise and benevolent contrivance 
that pain should warn us of the Mistake and Error ? 
If the bodies of the neglected poor did not shiver with 
cold and damp and wet ; if they did not ache with hun- 
ger, with fear, and the troop of ghastly diseases which 
invade the rearward ranks of men in all our human 



340 



PKOVIDENCE. 



march ; if ennui and the multiform maladies of body 
and spirit did not attack and disturb the class of men 
whose natural social burdens are borne by others ; if 
crime did not rise up and cry with its inarticulate mow- 
ings against the social waste and wrong ; if the exploi- 
tered servant did not take his revenge by unfaithful- 
ness ; if the neglected, the poor, the outcast, did not 
steal and rob, burn houses, and murder men ; if the 
slave did not run away, did not waste his employers' 
goods, and slay their children ; if the spoiled child did 
not turn out a profligate, and gnaw the bosom which 
bore him, — men would persevere in their social folly 
and perish. Animals are unconsciously taught by in- 
stinct — gregarious not social. Their organization into 
packs and flocks and herds is made ready for them like 
the pattern of then nests, and the garment which grows 
on their shoulders. Man is consciously teachable, self- 
instructive ; he learns by experiment ; not merely gre- 
garious but social, he is to construct his own social 
organization, as his garments and his house. There is 
always power enough, intellectual and moral, in each 
generation of men to construct the social or political 
organizations which that generations needs, which cor- 
respond to its state of development at that time. This 
is ideally demonstrable — for it follows by unavoidable 
deduction from the infinite perfection of God ; and his- 
torically demonstrable from all the past ages of hu- 
man progress and the present condition of men. But 
as men have a partial freedom, they may use or neglect 
this power of social organization. If they neglect the 
means which God has provided as adequate for his 
purpose and their social welfare, is it not benevolent 
in him to make things so that pain shall ring an 
alarm bell, as it were, and warn us of the Error ? If 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



341 



I will not put my cloak about me when the north 
air bites, shall God abolish winter to save me the trou- 
ble of thought ? If I have sense enough, and yet will 
eat green apples and not ripe ones, is it not well that I 
suffer ? 

Suppose that men not only suffered no pain in con- 
sequence of their social folly in violating the natural 
law of the universe, but they did not die in consequence 
of the error. Then the first experiment would be the 
last ; there would be an end of progress. We should 
advance no more than the beavers, or the bees. So 
there would be no continued growth of the faculties of 
mankind, no consequent increase of happiness, no qual- 
itative advance in mode, no quantitative in degree. 
Man would have stopped long ago in some low stage 
of development ; perhaps never have advanced beyond 
the culture of the men who have grown up amongst 
wolves in Hindostan, — a barking, a ferocious, and a 
stupid pack. 

I know how terrible this suffering is, how much in 
quantity, of a quality how sad; how many innocent 
men suffer from the average folly of mankind, through 
no Mistake or Error of their own. But take the whole 
world together this pain is not in excess, and its func- 
tion is plainly benevolent. Before us marches the at- 
tractive Idea of better things, a pillar of fire continually 
advancing towards the promised land which flows with 
milk and honey ; behind us, the Egyptian host of 
ignorance, and fear, and tyranny, and want, drive us on. 
Both are ministers of God's Providence. 

See what evil, comes in the Domestic Form. The 
ethic ideal of a family demands the marriage of loving 
men and women to then loving mates, two equivalent 

29* 



342 



PROVIDENCE. 



and free persons uniting in connubial love, manhood 
and womanhood combining into humanity. But are 
such marriages common ? Is the wife thought the 
equal, the equivalent of the husband; is the family al- 
ways based on love, connubial, parental, filial, friendly 
love ? The masculine element oppresses and enslaves 
the feminine. Man exploiters woman all the world 
over. How many live unmarried — against their na- 
ture, against their conscious will. Polygamy prevails 
" over three quarters of the groaning globe." In Chris- 
tendom the marriage of one to one is the ecclesiastic 
and legal ideal, the marriage-type. Is it also the fact ? 
How much is there of involuntary singleness — painful 
and against nature ; how much vice of many forms, 
odious to the thought ; what unhappiness from ill- 
assorted wedlock begun in haste, repented of at leisure, 
but made permanent by statute and public opinion? 
What a world of misery comes from the Mistakes and 
Errors men have made in the domestic organization of 
mankind and womankind ! 

Here the same reasoning applies — the proximate 
cause of the misery is the Mistake ; the function 
thereof is to warn men and stir them to belter ex- 
periments. All this matter of love might have been 
settled by laws that could not be broke, and like oaks, 
with no chance of mistake, men might 

" languidly adjust 
Their vapid, vegetable loves with anthers and with dust," 

or like the free buds of heaven be mated by instinct, 
Does any one think that would be an improvement ? 
Attracted by the Ideal of a perfect family, driven by 
pain from the actual, mankind moves on, each genera- 
tion of Jacobs and Rachels improving over the family 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



343 



of their predecessors, and with a continual increase of 
domestic bliss. The pain which comes from married 
and unmarried Error is not excessive for its work. 
Look the world over, disguising nothing, and you see 
how nicely this misery is fitted for its function and one 
day it will end. Only the boy cries over his multiplica- 
tion table. 

See the evil which comes of Mistakes and Errors in 
Religion — from Errors about Piety its sentimental 
part, about Theology its theoretical part, and Morality 
its practical part. Absolute Religion is the service of 
the Infinite God by the normal use, development, and 
enjoyment of every limb of the body, every faculty of 
the spirit, every power which we possess over matter or 
man. This is a service which is " perfect freedom." 
This is the Ideal of religion ; nothing short of this 
answers to the spiritual nature of man and the natural 
law of God. Every thing short of this is an Error, or 
a Mistake. 

But no considerable body of men has yet attained 
this Form of Religion. It is not consciously made the 
ideal of any sect of religionists in the world. How 
much suffering arises from the common notions of re- 
ligion in the most enlightened nations ! I have spoken 
of this so often in previous sermons that it is needless 
to say much now. But what fear among " Believers " 
of the popular theology, what littleness, what absurd 
singleness of the soul which longs for union with God ; 
what meanness and cowardice is found in men who try 
to wring and twist themselves into the spiritual contor- 
tions demanded by Hebrew, Mahometan, or Christian 
Priests ! What spiritual hunger is there of Unbelievers ! 
The ecclesiastical bodies founded on the popular Mis- 



344 PROVIDENCE. 

takes and Errors — how impotent they are to lead the 
nation to any great good work! What manifold evils 
come of this cause ! Look at the condition of the 
Christian world : its general Theology scornfully re- 
jected by scientific men ; the Roman Church dead ; 
the Greek Church for many centuries without life ; the 
Protestant churches of Europe divided, feeble, ruled 
like armies by kings ; and in many places what is offi- 
cially called " Religion," exacted of the people by the 
tax-gatherer and the constable ; the churches of Amer- 
ica divided, wrangling, and all unable to direct in nat- 
ural ways the immense energies of this great Common- 
wealth ; — nay, not daring to oppose the colossal Errors 
and Sins of the nation, or even to rebuke the political 
atheism which denies the Higher Law of God ! See 
what imbecility comes from a theology which calls on 
its followers to renounce reason ; for the sake of being 
spiritual, to give up the exercise of their spirit. What 
pain comes from belief in eternal punishment, the priest 
tormenting men before their time ! What misery comes 
from fearing a dreadful God ! Look at the oppression 
still practised in the name of religion — in Italy men 
shut in a Christian jail for reading the Christian Bible ; 
in almost every Christian state laws forbidding freedom 
of speech on matters relating to Christianity, the gal- 
lows reaching its arm over the pulpit. See how many 
men in America are driven to infidelity, to denial of all 
conscious religion, by the absurdities taught in its 
name ; how many are annually forced to hospitals for 
lunatics, incurably crazed by what is called religion. 
Acquisitiveness is doubtless the disease of America just 
now ; but the lust of money is less powerful than the 
popular theology in bringing men to public Bedlam. 
The theological mistake is incidental to human na- 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



345 



ture, — finite, free, progressive; the misery is an una- 
voidable result of the mistake, and has a benevolent 
function under the Providence of God. As perfect 
Cause he foreknew the history of mankind, all our Mis- 
takes in religious matters, and wisely put pain as an 
unavoidable consequence of avoidable Mistakes and 
Errors. If the mass of men in Northern Europe had 
not suffered from the false theology, false morality, false 
piety, and manifold oppression in the name of God im- 
posed on them by the Roman church, the world had 
been under Leos and Juliuses and Adrians to this day. 
Had not the unsatisfactory schemes of the Roman, 
Grecian, Hebrew theologies given pain to mankind, 
Christianity would have perished with Jesus ; nay, if 
men had not suffered from the mistakes of Egyptian 
priests, Moses would never have led Israel out of the 
iron house of bondage and the gross darkness which 
covered the people. The oxen surfer not from the let- 
ters which their master burns upon their horns ; the 
Roman ass is not pained by the image of St. Anthony 
which his superstitious master puts on him with a 
priestly blessing; if men suffered no more from false 
ideas of religion, we should be as oxen and asses, 
driven by other masters, and that to our ruin. 

In religion as elsewhere, God has provided for a con- 
tinual progress ; but it is all progression by experiment ; 
by many experiments which fail we reach the one that 
succeeds, and through the Red Sea escape from Egypt 
to the land of Promise. How long it took mankind to 
invent a machine driven by a river, or a flame of fire, 
that could spin and weave cotton ! And does it appear 
strange that man should err long and wide before he at- 
tains a perfect scheme of religion ? Fetichism was 
once a triumph, and satisfied the aspirations of devout 



346 



PROVIDENCE. 



mankind ; next man outgrew it, but cautious and con- 
servative still sought to wear the strait, scant girdle 
which devoured his loins ; at length urged by intol- 
erable pain, attracted by a better idea, he threw it away. 
Polytheism, Hebraism, Classic Deism, Romanism, have 
the same history, the same fate — once prayed for, then 
outgrown, and next prayed against and cast away. 
But the good of each is continually preserved. The 
Mosaic religion was an advance over the popular ser- 
vice of God in Egypt four thousand years ago ; the 
Jewish form of Christianity rose far above Moses ; the 
Pauline form transcended that ; Romanism is a com- 
promise between the Christianity of Paul, the Mosaism 
of the Hebrews, and the Polytheism of the Greeks and 
Romans. The human race went forward as they be- 
came Catholic Christians. Luther took a step in ad- 
vance of Rome ; Zuingle, Calvin, his fellow reformers, 
great men all of them, helped us still further on. But, 
pained by their imperfections, cheered by the Spirit of 
God in the soul of man which still tells of lands of 
promise before us, and still sends fire-pillars in every 
night to show the way over sands that furnish water, 
and through rivers which dry up to let us pass — the 
race still journeys on from Thebes to Jerusalem, from 
that to Rome, thence to Wittenberg, Basle, Geneva, 
Westminster ; and there is no end. Every step in re- 
ligion is an experiment ; if a wrong step it is painful. 
But the pain is medical. The fires of Moloch in Syria ; 
the harsh mutilations in the name of Astarte, Cybele, 
Jehovah ; the barbarities of imperial pagan tormentors ; 
the still grosser torments which Romano- Gothic Chris- 
tians in Italy and Spain heaped on their brother men, 
the fiendish cruelties to which Switzerland, France, the 
Netherlands, England, Scotland, Ireland, America have 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



347 



been witness, are not too powerful to warn men of the 
unspeakable evils which follow from Mistakes and 
Errors in this matter of religion. The present sufferings 
from belief and unbelief, it is easy to learn the lesson 
which they read. If we misuse the deepest and most 
powerful force in man, the pain which comes therefrom 
must needs be great. To pluck out a hair brings little 
pain ; but to rend off a limb, to tear out an eye — a 
dreadful misery forbids that sacrilege. Did not pain 
warn the Christian nations, the Protestant and the 
Catholic, as it ever has warned all loiterers, all wan- 
derers, we should stray further and further from our 
God, or else stop in our onward march ; and in either 
case lose the progressive joy of manly development of 
our religious powers. 

There is now intellectual and moral power enough 
active in the present generation to correct the evils of 
the popular theology of Christendom, the defects of its 
ecclesiastical machinery, and so to remove the suffering 
which comes from that. If we fail to apply these 
powers to this work, it is surely wise in the great 
Father to have so made the world that pain shall at 
length compel us to put off the shoe which pinches, and 
not suffer the foot to be spoiled. 

This fourfold Error in the formation of the State, the 
Community, the Family, and the Church — has brought 
a flood of misery upon the world. But it has forced 
mankind to a fourfold improvement — political, social, 
domestic, religious ; to a fourfold increase of human 
delight and blessedness. Every age has power to mend 
its machinery and to devise better. These Mistakes 
and Errors were foreseen by the Infinite God, at the 
creation, provided for, and the checks to them all made 



348 



PROVIDENCE. 



ready beforehand. Even here there is nothing imper- 
fect, but the motive, material, purpose, and means con- 
tinually reveal the infinite perfections of God. 

You see how a child makes Mistakes in getting com- 
mand of his body; how he stumbles in learning to 
walk and hurts his limbs by the fall ; but his wise 
mother cheers and encourages him. How he hurts his 
hands and feet before he learns the qualities thereof, and 
their normal relation to the things they touch ! What 
experiments he makes that fail before he learns the 
economic conditions which hedge him in! See how 
mankind toils and experiments in getting the entire 
command of any of our present instruments, living 
or inanimate. "What pain comes of each Mistake ! 
The ox gores his master ; the horse throws him ; 
Actaeon's hounds devour their lord — it is more than 
fable ; the Pine-bender is snatched up in his own tree. 
What a useful thing is fire ; what a powerful instru- 
ment in the world's civilization! It has been domes- 
ticated, I doubt not, some twenty or thirty thousand 
years. But even now what Mistakes we make in its 
use ; what evils it brings ! not a venturesome baby in the 
best ordered family, but puts his finger to the flame and 
starts when that schoolmaster sharply reminds him of 
the distinction between the Me and the Not- Me ; not a 
little village, never so dull, but it loses now and then a 
house, or barn, by this unruly servant ; not a city but 
has its conflagration, its police and engines to quell the 
element and keep the fire within its limits. Condense 
a thousand million men to one great consciousness ; 
consider the human race as one man twenty or thirty 
thousand years old, all his burnings do not make a 
greater proportionate amount of suffering than what 
befals our venturesome weanling who puts his disobe- 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



349 



dient fingers in the candle's flame. Would it be be- 
nevolent in God to take from boy or man the possibility 
of a Mistake in the use of fire, the consciousness of pain 
from such a Mistake ? 

Steam will probably work as great a change in the 
affairs of man, in domestic, social, political relations, 
as fire has done hitherto. But see what havoc it now 
makes of human life, with such recldess men in America 
tumultuating over land and water so heedless of the un- 
changing laws of God. What pain we suffer in getting 
command of this instrument ! It has been so with all 
the forces of Nature which man has tamed and domes- 
ticated. The entire amount of suffering is always pro- 
portionate to our lack of skill to manage the instru- 
ment; the more valuable the forces are the longer in- 
takes to learn all their powers and acquire the full mas 
tery over them. It is easy to tame a dove, hard to do- 
mesticate thunder and lightning. 

In the fifteenth century their were three Magi in Eu- 
rope, new-comers, looking for One born king of the 
world, — Mariner's Compass, Gunpowder, Printing- 
Press, such were their titles. What a world of mis- 
chief they wrought, disturbing everybody, — coasters, 
crossbowmen, scribes ! What spread of mischievous 
falsehoods took place ; what slaughter of men ; what 
shipwreck in mid ocean ! How grim they looked ! 
But those Magi all three of them came out of the 
eternal East of human consciousness ; following " the 
star which once stood still over a stable," they now fall 
down before Democracy, the Desire of all Nations ; 
while Herod seeks the young child's life to destroy him, 
they open their treasuries and present gifts, their gold, 
frankincense, and myrrh. 

Now to get the full mastery over the spirit of man, 

30 



350 



PROVIDENCE. 



to learn all the complicated powers of mind and con- 
science, heart and soul, so that mankind shall know 
all their modes of action, individual and social, as the 
chemist and the housewife know the powers and modes 
of action of fire, or as the engineer knows the powers 
and capabilities of steam ; to provide these various 
complicated and progressive faculties with their proper 
harness and machinery — political, social, domestic, ec- 
clesiastic, — for all their manifold purposes — that is a 
task far greater than the taming of cattle, the domesti- 
cation of fire and steam; far more difficult, requiring 
far more time for the work, and demanding innumerable 
experiments, continued for thousands of years, each in- 
cidentally subject to failure, and that unavoidably at- 
tended by pain and misery which can only be removed 
by correcting the Error, and mending the Mistake. 
But the misery is all along remedial, is never excessive 
for its work and function. God achieves the maximum 
of effect with the minimum of means ; the maximum 
of welfare with the minimum of misery. The whole 
amount of pain endured by mankind from political, 
social, domestic, and religious Mistakes and Errors, in 
the whole human history, is of a merciful and educa- 
tional character; comes from the same cause, for the 
same purpose, as the pain of burning the finger when 
thrust into a flame, and bears no greater relation to the 
whole consciousness of mankind than the suffering of 
an ordinary child in growing up to maturity. 

It is true the sufferings are often borne by such as 
had no part in producing the cause of suffering; nay, 
who sought to remove it, and on earth their .misery is 
not adequately compensated, — but this life is only a 
part of the whole human duration, half a hundred 
years out of eternity. The infinite Justice of God — 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



351 



foreknowing all, provided for every thing, before the 
world, or an atom thereof, was embarked on its endless 
voyage — must have provided a compensation some- 
where. This retribution to the parts which suffer from 
the Errors of the whole must take place somewhere in 
the world created by the perfect Cause, controlled by 
the perfect Providence ; for it is impossible that the 
Infinite God should create from an imperfect motive, 
of imperfect material, for an imperfect purpose, or as 
imperfect means thereto. When I cannot unriddle the 
details and see how John the Baptist and Jesus are to 
be recompensed for then early and violent death, how a 
recompense is to be afforded to the poor daughter of 
want, whom the Errors of society force unconscious 
into degradation, into crime, and an unnatural grave, 
half immature in body and wholly undeveloped in all 
the high qualities of womanhood, I am ready to trust 
the Infinite God. The warrant of ultimate human wel- 
fare is indorsed on every person, on each living thing, 
in the handwriting of the infinite God; and though I 
could not trust the promise of any of the popular finite 
deities, I am as sure of the Infinite God as I am that 
one and one make two, or that I myself exist. The 
instinctive desire of human nature is God's Promise to 
pay ; Eternity his time. 

Then look at the pain and misery which come from 
the intellectual Mistakes and moral Errors of mankind ; 
leave out nothing, diminish nothing, look St. Giles' in 
the face ; study the sufferings of all the Irelands of the 
earth ; confront all the wars of the world ; meet eye to 
eye that most hideous of living monsters, American 
Slavery, the lifeblood of three million men dripping 
from the democratic hand ; — examine the political, 



352 



PROYTDEXCE. 



social, domestic, and religious wretchedness of mankind, 
does it amount to Absolute Evil ? Is there any reason 
to think so ? Surely not. Are present pain and misery 
excessive for their unavoidable and merciful function ? 
Scrutinize with the nicest analysis of science, and 
you must confess that so far as the facts are known 
the benevolence of Providence perpetually appears ; and 
so far as the analogy reaches the same conclusion fol- 
lows. 

Then comes the scientific idea of the Infinite God to 
fill up the chasms which science leaves unfilled. A 
church, a family, a community, a State, is each a ma- 
chine formed of human materials, wherewith to achieve 
the religious, domestic, social, and political welfare of 
mankind: if the machine be a poor or ineffective tool, is 
it plainly wise and merciful, nay, just and loving, that 
pain should warn us of the insufficiency of the instru- 
ment ; and repeat the warning till we have abandoned 
it and made a wiser experiment ? As the centripetal 
and centrifugal forces in the solar system are just suffi- 
cient to keep each planet in its orbit, rythmically wheel- 
ing about the sun, with no deficiency, and no redun- 
dance, so is the pain which follows human Error but 
just enough to warn us of the ruin and hold us back. 
The astronomical conclusion is mathematically demon- 
strable from the facts of observation and the intuitions 
of consciousness; the human conclusion is not yet 
inducible from facts of observation, but deducible with 
most rigorous science from the idea of God as Infi- 
nite. The amount of misery is a variable quantity, 
controlled by the conduct of mankind ; we diminish it 
just as we learn and keep the natural laws of God, the 
original human means he has provided for his divine 
purpose. 



THE ECONOMY OP PAIN. 



353 



So much for the Evil which comes from Mistakes 
and Errors. 



Look next at the Evil of Sin — the pain and misery 
which come thereof. A man knows the moral law of 
God ; he has learned it by experiment, or by intuition 
which anticipates experience ; he knows the true, the 
moral beautiful, the just, the afFectional, the holy. 
Conscience is powerful enough to say " Thou ought- 
est ! " There it stops and leaves us free to obey, or 
disobey. It does not say, " Thou must ! Thou shaft! " 
It does not hold us bound. I know the right ; I have 
the power to do, or to refuse to do it. That is my free- 
dom, my most subtle, most dangerous gift ; it is the 
most precious too. Perhaps I shall not do the right I 
know I ought ; I will not make the ideal of my moral 
nature the actual of my daily work. If the moral or 
religious faculty compelled me, I should be its slave ; 
not a free man, only a bare tool of the Almighty. If 
conscience compels me to realize the Ideal' it reveals, if 
the affections force me to live out my ideal love for 
man, and the soul constrain me to acts of holiness, then 
I only- gravitate to my ideal ; I cease to be a free spirit- 
ual individuality. It is not I that love, but the force 
which acts through me, foreign though divine. I obey 
it voluntarily, then the will of God becomes my per- 
sonal act, I am a conscious co-worker with the Infinite. 
I am not a moral fossil, not a moral animal, but a 
moral man. I feel at one with myself; all my high 
faculties consent to the Ideal of my conscience and con- 
form in this act of will. I am self-balanced ; my own 
centre of gravity is my centre of motion also ; my will 
accords with the will of God ; he and I are at one ; 

30 * 



354 



PROVIDENCE. 



his will my work. I have the delight of my freedom 
well employed. 

If I do not obey my sense of right, straightway there 
comes remorse ; I gnaw upon myself. My wrong dis- 
turbs the integrity of the universe. I am not at ease. 
Conscious of violating my own integrity, I feel ashamed 
and inwardly tormented because the ideal of my mind 
and conscience, heart and soul is not the actual of my 
conduct. 

This is the first subjective consequence of Sin ; it is 
a form of pain peculiar, distinct from all other modes 
of suffering. I suppose every grown man knows what 
it is. I will not speak from observation of others, but 
from consciousness and my own inward experience ; I 
know the remorse which comes from conscious viola- 
tion of my own integrity, from treason to myself and 
my God, from consciousness of sacrificing my univer- 
sal Ideal of the true, the just, the moral beautiful, the 
affectional, the holy, to some private personal caprice. 
It transcends all bodily pain, all grief at disappointed 
schemes, all anguish which comes from the sickness; 
yea, from the death of dear ones prematurely sent 
away. To these afflictions I can bow with " Thy will, 
not mine, be done." But remorse, the pain of Sin — 
that is my work. This comes obviously to warn us of 
the ruin which lies before us ; for as the violation of 
the natural material conditions of bodily life leads to 
dissolution of the body, so the wilful, constant viola- 
tion of the natural conditions of spiritual well-being 
leads to the destruction thereof. So the pain of re- 
morse comes wisely and mercifully to warn me from 
my ruin. It anticipates the outward consequence ; it 
comes as the disagreeable smell, or warning look, or 
repulsive taste of poison. A State with no statute 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



355 



against high-treason, no punishment therefor, would 
be exceedingly imperfect. Remorse is the subjective 
consequence, the penal retribution ; yea, the medicine 
and cure for this high-treason against the soul and 
against its God. 

The outward consequences of Sin are the same as 
those of Error or Mistake, and require no specific de- 
scription. 

Sin is a wrong choice ; a preference of the wrong way 
to the right one. No man loves the wrong for its own 
sake, as an end, but as a means for some actual good it 
is thought to lead to. It is one of the incidents of our 
attempt to get command over all our faculties. In 
learning to walk, hoAV often we stumble ; we stammer 
in attempts to speak ; and babies babble long before 
they talk. In learning to read, to write, how children 
mistake the letters, miscall the sounds, miswrite the 
words ! Sin is a corresponding incident — we learn 
self-command by experiments, experiments which fail. 

I think this evil is rather underrated. Consciously to 
violate the integrity of your spirit is a worse evil than 
men seem to fancy. Oh ! young man, expect Error of 
yourself, expect Alistakes. Your eye deceives you, so 
may your mind and conscience, your heart and soul. 
Expect also analogous wanderings in getting self-com- 
mand. But do not tolerate any conscious violations of 
your own integrity ; the experience of that will torment 
you long, till sorrow has washed the maiming brand out 
of your memory, and long years of goodness have filled 
up the smarting scar. ' Men grown see the right, see it 
plainly ; it does not serve their special turn, in trade, in 
politics, in the pursuit of pleasure or of power. They 
trample their ideal underfoot. The subjective pain and 



356 



PROVIDENCE. 



misery which comes thereof, is a just and merciful con- 
trivance of the eternal Father. 

There are men of little excellence but of great con- 
ceit, bigoted men, wonted to the machinery of social 
and ecclesiastical routine, their wheels deep in the ruts 
of custom, omitting the weighty matters of love to men 
and God ; who tithe mint, anise, and cumin, and 
thank God continually that they are not like the publi- 
can ; to such men a sin, a rousing public sin, will do 
good, and in heaven they may thank God for it. I 
have known such men, and have thought if they could 
commit some great Sin, they might become less sinful. 
Jesus told a rich man, — probably one wedded to 
wealth, — to sell all he had and give to the poor. 
There are men so conceited with their own excellence, 
and besotted with custom, that I have sometimes 
thought the same Jesus would tell them to do some 
monstrous thing and get ashamed of themselves, and 
learn how worthless is their self-conceit. But the 
Sin-cure, even for such a man, is like healing rheuma- 
tism by burning the afflicted member to the bone. 

As we get command over the body only by exper- 
iment, learning to run, to walk, to swim only by trial ; 
as by experiment we learn the rules of expediency and 
of right, learning each with many Mistakes and Errors, 
with many a pain ; so by experiments are we to learn 
the proper uses of the will, to keep the law of God 
when known. It is only in this way that the individ- 
ual, the family, the community, the State, the world 
knows the power of the personal, or the accumulated 
will, and how to keep the law of God when known. 
So there are moral experiments in all these forms, and 
Sins of the Family, the Community, the Nation, and the 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



357 



World, which come as incidents of human development. 
The pain thereof is an unavoidable consequence of the 
transgression, and a warning that the trespass has been 
wrought. I am glad it cost me efforts to learn to speak, 
to walk, to know the rule of right, else were I less a 
man. The pains I have felt from Errors here are joy- 
ous pains at last* So too am I glad God gave me 
power to go astray even when I know the right ; glad 
that it costs me hard efforts to learn the uses of my will, 
to subject the transient caprice of personal desire to the 
eternal true, right, moral beautiful, lovely and holy of 
the Infinite God. And though remorse has been my 
keenest pain — I know it is my highest birthright which 
the pain stands over and guards as watchful sentinel. 
At the creation, the perfect Cause knew all the future 
wanderings of each man, the Mistakes of the intellect, 
the Errors of the conscience, the Sins of the will ; and 
as the check thereto he mercifully appointed pain to 
come to the individual, family, community, the nation, 
and the world. 

Theologians often talk mythologically about Sin, as 
if there was something mysterious in its origin, its cause, 
its process, its result, and final end. They tell us that 
as it is a transgression against the Infinite God, so it is 
an Infinite Evil, meaning an absolute evil, demanding 
an eternal punishment. To this scholastic folly it is 
enough to reply, that if sin be for this reason an Abso- 
lute Evil, then, the smallest suffering coming from an 
Infinite God is an Infinite Suffering, and cancels the 
Sin. 

Sin is said to be a " Fall ; " yea, as the child's at- 
tempt to walk is a stumble. But the child through 
stumbling learns to walk erect ; every fall is a fall up- 



358 



PROVIDENCE. 



ward. Creeping is an advance over stillness, stumbling 
over creeping. In the yearling boy the feet are soft and 
tender, the legs feeble, unable to sustain the pulpy 
frame. But the instinct of motion stirs the young 
master of creation to press forward ; not content with 
creeping he tries to walk, he falls, and cries with pain. 
He dries at length his tears, and tries and falls again, 
again to weep. But gradually, by trial, the limbs grow 
strong, the eye steady ; he walks erect ; he runs down 
steep places ; up and down the snow-clad Alps Hannibal 
marches through the winter, leading his army of men 
each a stumbling baby once. 

Through weakness of mind and conscience we may 
err — the Error has its check, and Nature has the cure. 
No mistake is eternal. At first the little child pricked 
with a pin only feels pained in his general consciousness, 
not discriminating the special spot that smarts. By 
and by, instructed by experience of pain, and so familiar 
with the geography of his little world of flesh, when 
hurt he lays his hand on the afflicted spot to localize 
the grief ; at length he learns to scrutinize the cause and 
to apply the cure. Thus is it with mankind. Weak- 
ness of the Affections, of the Soul, of the Will, is not 
eternal. Sin, with its consequent pain, is transient as 
Errors and Mistakes. Stumblings of the body, the 
mind and conscience, heart and soul, belong to baby- 
hood — the early or the late ; incidents of our develop- 
ment. If the first step is a fall — the step is still a pro- 
gress, the fall is forward. In the days of Abraham, 
Isaac, and Jacob, how poorly women spun and wove. 
But the bungling craft of Sarah, Rebecca, and Rachel 
does not retard the mill of Manchester, of Lowell and 
Lyons. From Sarah to Jacquard what a stride ! mill- 
ions of experiments that failed strew all the way. The 



THE ECONOMY OE PAIN. 



359 



mistakes of the first farmers nobody copies now; but 
the cereal grasses, which, as the story tells, a mytho- 
logic queen first brought to Italy, all round the tem- 
perate world grow corn for daily bread. What have I 
to do with the stammering of my fathers ten thousand 
years ago, when the language had but a hundred 
words perhaps ? Does it bar me from eloquence and 
all the nice distinctions of scientific speech ? Nay my 
own blunders in babyhood, boyhood, manhood — blun- 
ders of the body, of the spirit — do they disturb me 
now ? They are outgrown and half-forgot. I learned 
something by each one. So is it with Sin, the world's 
Sin, your Sin and mine. Pain checks all heedless 
motion ; we learn the lesson but forget the pain. 

Men start, in these times, with the idea of a dreadful 
God, who made men badly at first, and then set them 
a-going; when they stumble he falls on them, brings 
them to the ground and crashes them down to endless 
hell ; only a few he sends his Son to help and lift up — 
all the rest lie there and rot in everlasting woe. The 
pain of ihis folly will one day drive us from the greatest 
Error of the human race — from the belief in a devilish 
God and an eternal Hell. Our successors will forget 
it as we the follies of our sires who worshipped stocks 
and stones before they dreamed of Odin and of Thor. 

See now the obvious use of Pain and Misery, — they 
are plainly beneficent. In the State, the Community, 
the Family, the Church, the Individual Man, it is not 
hard to see their general function. Evil is partial. 
There is no Absolute Evil. Man advances forever- — 
the perfect means goes forward to achieve the perfect 
purpose. Man oscillates in his march as the moon 



360 



PROVIDENCE. 



nods in her course. Pain marks the limit of his vibra- 
tion ; the variables of human caprice are perpetually 
controlled by the constants of divine Providence. Once 
man, prone and mute, was the slave of Nature, the 
absolute savage, the wild man of the woods, over- 
mastered by his elementary instincts which so jealously 
keep watch over the individual and the race ; that com- 
rade of the wolf, with many a painful step has jour- 
neyed on — his life a progress, his march triumphal. 
See what the past life of mankind has brought about — 
fixed habitations, language, letters, arts, science, litera- 
ture, laws, manners, religion. What a growth from the 
time when these ten fingers were the only tools of man, 
and all his mightier faculties lay below the horizon of 
his consciousness ! 

Look at the evils of our time — as political oppres- 
sion, the strong nations ruling the weak with iron rods, 
the government exploitering the people; look at war, 
at social oppression, the strong laying their burdens on 
the weak, in this age of commercial tyranny, at despo- 
tism by the dollar which takes the place of the old des- 
potism by the sword; look at slavery — total in Carolina, 
partial in all Christendom ; domestic oppression, woman 
exploitered by man ; ecclesiastical oppression — false 
Ideas of God, of Man, of the Relation between the 
two form a three-pronged spear wherewith Superstition 
goads the race of men in all lands. Look at poverty, 
ignorance, drunkenness, prostitution, murder, theft, and 
every vice. What misery comes of all these evils ! But 
they were all foreseen and are provided for in the care- 
ful housekeeping of God. The past history shows 
what checks there always have been ; what powers 
come forth equal to each emergency. If the world 
were to end to-day- — it would seem a failure, man's 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



361 



desires not satisfied, the budding promise of the race 
not growing into fruit, or even flower. But this is only 
the beginning of the history of man on earth, 

" A thousand years scarce serve to form a State ; " 

many a thousand years there must be to form the 
great Commonwealth of Man where the perfect State, 
Community, Family, and Church shall have their home. 

The pain of Sin is the pain of surgery, nay, the pain 
of growth. My sin-burnt soul dreads the consuming 
fire, its pain a partial good. God provided for it all, 
making all things work together for good. My suffer- 
ing shames me from conscious wrong, stings me into 
efforts ever new ; and I flee from consuming Sodom 
with a swifter flight. The loving-kindness of the In- 
finite Mother has provided also for this evil, for its cure. 
There is retribution everywhere — for I am conditioned 
by the moral law of God. In youth Passion tempts 
me to violate the integrity of my consciousness with 
its excess, I love the pleasure of the flesh ; in manhood 
Ambition offers the more dangerous temptation, I love 
the profit of selfishness. If I yield and sacrifice the 
eternal Beauty of the true, the just, the good, the holy 
to the riot of debauch, or to the calculated selfishness 
of that ambition, there comes the subjective conse- 
quence, — a sense of falseness, of shame, a loathing 
of myself, the leprous feeling that I am unclean, 
the sleepless worm which gnaws the self-condemning 
heart ; then comes the outward evil, the resultant of my 
wrong, — men band against me, to check my wicked 
deeds. One wheel is blocked by remorse ; and human 
opposition holds the other fast. So suffering keeps my 
wrong in check. I am thus pained by every evil thing 

31 



362 



PROYIDEXCE. 



I do. In the next life I hope to suffer till I learn the 
mastery of myself, and keep the conditions of my 
higher life. Through the Red Sea of pain I will 
march to the promised land, the divine Ideal guiding 
from before, the Egyptian Actual urging from behind. 

Liability to Mistake, to Error and to Sin, is the in- 
dispensable condition of human freedom. That is not 
absolute but partial, relative. I know the Infinite Fa- 
ther holds the line which tethers me ; that He gave to 
man this human nature in us all, with just the quality 
and quantity of powers needful as means to execute 
his perfect purpose and fulfil his perfect motive. I 
know that he will draw us back and lead us home at 
last, losing none of his flock, dropping no son of per- 
dition by the way ; but a great ways off meeting his 
prodigals a-coming home, or if they only will to come ; 
yea he has means which move their will without con- 
straint, for he is Infinite God, the perfect Cause, the 
perfect Providence. The world he makes, from a per- 
fect motive, of a perfect material, for a perfect purpose, 
and as a perfect means, is the best world which the in- 
finite God could make ; the best of all possible Crea- 
tors must make the best of all possible worlds — with 
the minimum of pain securing the maximum of bliss. 

Men often exaggerate the amount of Sin — its quan- 
titative evil, not its qualitative. Much which passes by 
this name is Mistake, or Error ; many depraved deeds 
are done with little depravity, perhaps with none. I 
see the evils which come of conscious or unconscious 
wrong. Here are men who walk the streets self-mutilated 
of limb, or feature, by violation of the body's laws ; others 
maimed, still worse, of limb, or feature, of the spirit. Is 
their Error, their Sin, an Absolute Evil ? The Infinity 
of God forbids. The Man-butcher of New Zealand, the 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



363 



Man-stealer of New England have not fallen beyond 
lifting up. One day the better nature of each shall be 
wakened. Even such transgression is not absolute. 
The high-priests in Jerusalem who paid Judas his thirty 
pieces, the price of blood shed by his treachery; the 
low priests in Boston who paid the latest kidnapper his 
fee, their praises and their prayers, alike the price of 
blood shed by his treachery, they are under the Provi- 
dence of the Infinite Mother who at the beginning pro- 
vided for all of her children. All these shall one day 
measure their lives by the golden rule of Love. 

I see the enormous mass of human misery which 
comes of Mistakes, Errors, Sins. I see its cause; I 
know its prophecy. It tells me of the vast powers of 
man — of the individual, and the race. The power of 
wrong is but a mistaken power of right. The wicked 
Statutes men enact, come as incidents in the nation's 
moral growth ; the wars, the tyrannies, the slaveries of 
old time and modern days, are wanderings from the 
path we are to take ; local, partial, only for a time. 
The devastations wrought by misdirection of the relig- 
ious faculty reveal its power, and foretell its normal tri- 
umph in time to come. I lift my eyes from the present 
to the past. What a triumphal progress has been the 
march of man! Still is the human face set forward. 
The Cannibal in New Zealand is far above the wolf- 
bred child in Hindostan ; far before the merely savage 
man. Even the Kidnapper of New England is in ad- 
vance of the Cannibal of the Pacific. The increase of 
crime in all Europe since the revival of letters, marks a 
step forward. Immortality is for each man. Eternity 
stretches out before the race. And in the protracted 
childhood and great Errors of man I foresee his manly 
and majestic march in days to come. God bound the 



364 



PEOVIDENCE. 



beasts ; it was in mercy to them. Only by change of 
body can the adult animal advance. For them there is 
no progress of the family, the tribe, or race. Little is 
left for their free choice ; so as they venture little, they 
win no more. The God of oxen provides for them as 
Infinite Providence, by his will, not their own. But 
the larger venture in man is liable to worse contingen- 
cies of ill ; destined also to produce a higher resultant 
of bliss. 

Tell me of war, of slavery, of want, of political, social, 
domestic oppression ; tell me of the grim terrors of the 
Popular theology — its religion a torment, its immor- 
tality a curse, its deity a devil ; tell me of Atheism, its 
doubt, its denial, its despair, — its here and no Here- 
after, its body without a Soul, its world without a 
God ; — tell me what pain and misery come of all these, 
and by the greatness of the aberration I measure the 
greatness of the orbit and the orb ; for in the centre of 
the universe, its ever present Cause, its ever active 
Providence, I see the Infinite God, I feel him immanent 
in every particle of matter, in each atom of Spirit ; and 
how can I fear ? The nodding of a school-boy's top is 
not the measure for the oscillations of a world. 

The greatest present evil is small compared to what 
man has already lived through and so far overpowered, 
that most men deem it blasphemy to say they ever were. 
Absolute Evil is not in Error, its misery is its check, 
points to its cure, helps to its end. Is it in Sin ? Yea, 
if Sin were endless ; to act wrong, think wrong, feel 
wrong, be wrong, — at variance with self, with Nature 
and with God — that is misery, absolute evil were it 
endless. Not only is all the analogy of the universe 
against the monstrous thought, each drop of Science 
drained off from the world of space and time corroding 



THE ECONOMY OF PAIN. 



365 



and eating away this ugly thing ; but the Idea of God's 
Infinite Perfection annihilates the boyish dream. Sup- 
pose I am the blackest of sinners, that as Cain I slew 
my brother, as Iscariot I betrayed him — and such a 
brother — or as a New England kidnapper I sold him to 
be a slave — and blackened with such a sin I come to 
die — still I am the child of God, of the Infinite God ; 
he foresaw the consequences of my faculties, of the free- 
dom he gave me, of the circumstances which girt me 
round, and do you think he knows not how to bring me 
back, that he has not other circumstances in store to 
waken other faculties and lead me home, compensating 
my variable hate with his own Constant Love ! 

" Come, then, expressive silence, muse his praise." 



THE END. 



- 



I 




- 



Deacidified using the Bookkeeper proces 

"'^ ,<A X ~ %- . Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 



Treatment Date: May 2006 

PreservationTechnologies 

A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVATION 

1 1 1 Thomson Park Drive 
Cranberry Township. PA 16066 
(724) 779-2111 



1 f> 



,0o. 



- 




'"fUlllllllll 

0 016 130 178 4 j 



